The Iranian regime has made headlines this week with its announcement that it will allow inspections into its recently discovered enrichment site in Qom, and its agreement, albeit ambiguously, to allow enrichment to be handled by Russia or France. Less covered, but actually more important, are recent statements from the Iranian opposition against the nuclear weapons program--warning Western leaders not to be fooled by Ahmdinejad’s latest concessions, and actually offering a viable alternative to solve the current nuclear standoff.
Iran’s leadership knows that every policy decision about Iran in the West, or even in Russia and China, is haunted by the specter of the Iranian democratic movement--a recognition that the regime is suffering from profound inner fissures and lack of legitimacy at home. Russian vacillation in its support of the current Iranian government has left Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad worried about losing their international support. Their foreign policy is founded on the assumption that Russia and China will support them against any serious UN sanctions. To ensure the continuation of this crucial support, the regime has had to offer some concessions on the nuclear issue. Moreover, Khamenei does not want to fight on two fronts: with Iranian democrats at home, and with the international community abroad.
While the regime is showing conciliatory signs to the West, at home they have tried to sell the latest agreement as a great victory for the regime. The world, their message is, has come around to accept Iran’s terms. For example, the commander of Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps, talking to 300 Basiji supporters meeting in the still-occupied American embassy compound in Tehran on Friday, announced that the Khatami style of negotiation was tantamount to treason and the new empowered Iran is forcing its terms on the West. The often-implied and sometimes-explicit message is that the policy of confrontation pursued by Khamenei and Ahmadinejad--as opposed to the policy of negotiating with the West suggested by reformists--has allowed them to now negotiate from a position of strength. To reinforce that message, they also engaged in the provocative act of testing a new medium-range missile. Ahmadinejad’s suggestion that Iran’s next meeting with the group of 5+1 should be at the level of heads of state is rooted more in his need for a legitimizing photo-op than any substantive policy initiative.
Iranian democrats, on the other hand, have in recent days made a concentrated effort to tell the world that the regime is in fact negotiating from a position of weakness; that it does not intend to abide by any agreements they now make; and, most importantly, that the democrats are committed to approaching the nuclear issue differently than the current regime. It is these statements that deserve the most attention in the West.
In recent years, the regime in Tehran and its apologists in America have cultivated the myth that on the nuclear issue, there is a "national consensus" in Iran, and that nothing separates the regime from its democratic opponents. From this faulty premise, many policymakers draw the conclusion that the United States must make a deal with the current regime and not wait or worry about a more democratic Iran. Three statements in the last few days have proven this premise faulty. In reading these statements, we must bear in mind that the reformists are all trying to walk a fine line in demarcating their position from that of the regime, while not offering any opportunities for the regime to accuse them of selling out Iran’s sovereign rights.
First came an announcement early last week by Mohsen Makhmalbaff, a spokesperson for the Green Movement. In carefully calibrated language that would allow democratic leaders in Iran plausible deniability yet convince the reader that he was in fact speaking on their behalf, Makhmalbaff declared that Iranian democrats do not want a nuclear bomb, they understand the international community’s anxieties about the current regime’s nuclear program, and indeed share those same anxieties.
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COMMENTS (3)
AM:
Russian vacillation in its support of the current Iranian government has left Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad worried about losing their international support.
GW:
This is the potential paradox, isn't it?
If the Iranian government is on the level about Qom and the enrichment issue, the international community might back off considerbly in isolating them. But if it does that, Tehran may well use this slack to crack down further on the reformers.
So, which is more important---yanking on the nuclear leash or supporting more openly democratic elements in Iran?
How is a balance struck between them? Perhaps we shall see just how bogus the commitment to democracy there i ... view full comment
AM:
Russian vacillation in its support of the current Iranian government has left Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad worried about losing their international support.
GW:
This is the potential paradox, isn't it?
If the Iranian government is on the level about Qom and the enrichment issue, the international community might back off considerbly in isolating them. But if it does that, Tehran may well use this slack to crack down further on the reformers.
So, which is more important---yanking on the nuclear leash or supporting more openly democratic elements in Iran?
How is a balance struck between them? Perhaps we shall see just how bogus the commitment to democracy there is if Iran is welcomed back into the "community of nations" despite more repressive internal policies.
Everything is always more complicated when people stop pretending it isn't. So most folks never do of course.
AM:
"....every policy decision about Iran in the West, or even in Russia and China, is haunted by the specter of the Iranian democratic movement...."
GW:
Maybe. But don't think for a moment the Iranian democratic movement isn't haunted by American policy in Afghanistan in the 1980s...or its policy of abandoning the Kurds and the Shite in Iraq after Desert Storm.
As for China and Russia, who but the most naive would put much stock in the motivation behind their foreign policy commitments?
Still, we like to pretend that in regimes like Iran, Russia and China the government is on automatic pilot in duping "the people", while over here we can trust almost everything our government tells us because it's part of our democratic traditions.
Right.
And who are these "Iranian democrats"? What is their moral and political agenda? Are they capitalists? collectivists? Are they embracing social policies that weaken sharia...policies that open doors for women and gays and minorities? Or do Spinesters basically embrace them instead not for what they support, but who they are against?
george walton
Here goes loony George Waltunes acting as if he knew what he were talking about. He doesn't and his imaginary and pathetic "conversation" with the author of the post is an attempt to tell himself that people actually care what he writes.
Loony Waltunes should save his arthtritic fingers, no one here cares.
Here goes loony George Waltunes acting as if he knew what he were talking about. He doesn't and his imaginary and pathetic "conversation" with the author of the post is an attempt to tell himself that people actually care what he writes.
Loony Waltunes should save his arthtritic fingers, no one here cares.
" When negotiations inevitably break down, neither military action nor partial sanctions will stop the regime’s drive for nuclear weapons. Only a democratic Iran can solve the current impasse."
A democratic Iran? When is that happening? Before or after the mullahs acquire their nuke bomb?
We should do nothing with the mullahs because we are inevitably bound to fail? Abbas Milani must be kidding.
" When negotiations inevitably break down, neither military action nor partial sanctions will stop the regime’s drive for nuclear weapons. Only a democratic Iran can solve the current impasse."
A democratic Iran? When is that happening? Before or after the mullahs acquire their nuke bomb?
We should do nothing with the mullahs because we are inevitably bound to fail? Abbas Milani must be kidding.