Hidden Iran

by Ray Takeyh

  The surprising aspect of the public debate in Iran is the extent to which it mirrors the discussions that took place in China, India, and Israel before those states joined the nuclear club. National prestige, notions of sovereign independence, great-power hypocrisy, and the need for a viable deterrence posture against enemies, both imagined and real, dominate Iranian newspapers and official discourse. Although Iran initiated its program to address certain strategic challenges, as the program matures, nationalistic sentiments and patronage politics are emerging as rationales for sustaining it. To be sure, the level of nationalistic pressure has not reached the heights achieved in India or Pakistan, but as time passes public opinion is likely to harden, belying the notion that prolonged negotiations and incremental pressure will somehow solve the problem. Even if the original strategic calculus that provoked the search for nuclear weapons alters, the program may actually continue as it becomes part of Iran’s national identity.

  A NUCLEAR FUTURE?

  Today the Islamic Republic stands at a crossroads. For nearly three years, Iran was involved in delicate negotiations with Britain, France, and Germany regarding the direction of its nuclear program. Subsequently, it began contemplating a plan for outsourcing its nuclear enrichment activities to Russia. As Iran’s nuclear program becomes the subject of deliberations at the UN Security Council, it is time for a more imaginative approach. Ultimately, the course of Iran’s nuclear policy may be decided less by what the UN contemplates than by what the Americans do. The nature of Iran’s relations with the United States and what type of security architecture emerges in the Persian Gulf are likely to determine Iran’s decisions. It is neither inevitable nor absolute that Iran will become the next member of the nuclear club; its internal debates are real and its course of action still unsettled. The international community and the United States will have an immeasurable impact on Iran’s nuclear future. A more inventive U.S. diplomacy can still prevent Iran from crossing the nuclear threshold and assembling a bomb.

  As Iran grabs headlines and as its nuclear program becomes the subject of sensationalist accounts and exaggerated claims, it is important to appreciate that this is not the first time that the international community has faced a proliferation challenge. Since the inception of the atomic bomb, many states have looked at its awesome power as a solution to their security problems, yet their course of action was reversed. In the past two decades, states as varied as Brazil, Argentina, and Ukraine eventually retreated from the nuclear precipice. Although each state is different and must be viewed within the context of its national experiences, in all cases, diminishing external threats have been critical to their relinquishment of nuclear ambitions. In a similar vein, economic incentives such as favorable commercial ties and access to international lending organizations have been effective, because they provide palpable benefits to ruling elites. It is rare, however, for a state that views nuclear weapons as fundamental to its security interests to dispense with such weapons under relentless threats of military reprisal and economic strangulation. Decades of pressure and economic sanctions ultimately did not dissuade Pakistan from pursuing a nuclear option it felt was necessary for national survival. Similarly, it appears that China’s tense relations with the United States ultimately pushed it toward an indigenous nuclear capability, irrespective of costs and burdens. In the end, it appears that a clever mixture of incentives and penalties can accomplish more in the realm of counterproliferation than can threats of military reprisal and economic coercion.

  As Washington seeks to grapple with Iran’s nuclear challenge, it must accept that its threats and its hostile rhetoric have limited effect in altering Iran’s path. Indeed, a belligerent U.S. posture only assists those within the theocracy who argue that the American danger can only be negated through the possession of the “strategic weapon.” Given the disutility of force and threats, a realistic engagement strategy may still alter Iran’s nuclear course. President Ahmadinejad should not be the focus of U.S diplomacy, as his pathologies are immutable. However, should Washington and its allies craft a generous package of security assurances and measurable sanctions relief in exchange for Tehran’s suspension of the critical components of its nuclear infrastructure, it may succeed in peeling away important clerical power brokers from the cause of nuclear arms.

  Beyond crafting such a package, the additional key to resolving Iran’s nuclear conundrum lies in international solidarity. It is unlikely that the Islamic Republic will be impressed with measures that do not enjoy multilateral consensus. It is thus critical for Washington to sustain the support of its European allies, and to the extent possible, keep China and Russia on board.

  If Iran rejects this concerted diplomatic effort, then the United States will have an easier time reaching a consensus through the United Nations to enact tough multilateral sanctions. Examining the past history of countries that have renounced nuclear weapons or potential weapons programs, the predominant theme is that these renunciations took place only after those countries experienced a lessening of external threats. A more constructive American diplomacy can still go a long way to assure the success of its nonproliferation pledges.

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  IRAN’S

  NEW IRAQ

  Iran’s relations with no other country have been as complicated and tortuous as its ties with Iraq. It is often assumed that Iran and Iraq are natural antagonists, destined to have relations marked by friction and tension. Given the countries’ prolonged war in the 1980s and their sustained attempts to assert influence in the Persian Gulf, such a narrative has a degree of historical justification. Still, today emphatic voices suggest that the post-Saddam Iraq with its empowered Shiite majority is likely to emerge as a close ally, if not an actual subsidiary, of the Islamic Republic. The question then becomes, which of these two accounts actually comes closest to reality?

  The turbulent history between the two nations can alternatively support a variety of assessments and predictions. It is true that the two sides fought a vicious war that destroyed both countries’ infrastructure and scarred a generation. And yet, how does one explain the long periods of cooperation between them in the years since Iraq assumed its formal independence in 1932? The answer lies in the domestic political complexion of the two parties. When both Iran and Iraq were governed by conservative monarchies, they managed to regulate their competition, contain their differences, and even cooperate on issues of common concern. However, the revolutionary, Ba’athist regime in Iraq, which took power in 1968, found the Pahlavi dynasty objectionable, just as Iran’s theocrats would later find Saddam Hussein reprehensible. All this is not to suggest that the two sides are free of territorial disputes or regional ambitions that may provoke difficulties. But such tensions are harder to resolve by regimes that are ideological antagonists.

  Much in the Middle East changed in the past few years as Saddam’s tyranny was displaced by American military intervention. The political empowerment of the Shiite community in Iraq is likely to portend better relations with Iran, since many of Iraq’s leading Shiite political actors have close and intimate ties with the Islamic Republic. Despite the alarmist discussions regarding Iran’s determination to spread its revolution next door, for Tehran the critical issue remains preventing Sunni domination of Iraqi politics, as in the past such a monopoly of power by a distinct minority group had led it to embrace an aggressive pan-Arabist ideology as a means of justifying its political hegemony. The rulers of the Islamic Republic have no illusions that the Shiites in Iraq are likely to concede to their authority, but they are merely seeking a more amenable set of interlocutors next door. For the first time since the overthrow of the Hashemite monarchy in 1958, Iraq is no longer a revisionist state infused with discursive pan-Arabist pretensions. After all the diplomatic maneuvers and conflicts, it was the American invasion that finally opened the possibility of not just improved but friendly relations between two of the Middle East’s bitterest enemies.

  In yet another paradox of
the Middle East, two other antagonists of the region, the United States and Iran, now find themselves uneasily on the same side of the Iraq debate. A cursory examination of the news coverage will often find U.S. officials complaining about Iran’s conduct, its disturbing influence, and its unsavory activities. For their own reasons, both parties have come to view democratic pluralism as the most suitable path for the future of Iraq. The Bush administration’s missionary zeal to promote representative governments across the Arab world actually stems from a judicious perception that in the end, democracies constitute the most peaceful form of government. In the meantime, an Iranian regime that seeks to diminish the power of its Sunni foes and keep Iraq weak and divided is also pressing for representative government that is destined to strengthen the provinces at the expense of central power, and the Shiites at the expense of the Sunnis. The success of democratic rule in Baghdad is thus one of the few things that both Washington and Tehran can agree on.

  To properly appreciate the changing dynamics of Iran-Iraq relations, we must assess the critical turning points in this relationship since the inception of modern Iraq. Such an examination will reveal that more than territorial disputes or contending hegemonic aspirations, it was ideology that caused tension and ultimately war between these two states. While the monarchical governments managed to contain their disputes, the ideological regimes of Saddam Hussein and the Iranian mullahs ultimately waged a devastating war against each other. Today, for the first time, ideology does not seem a source of friction and tension between the two states, portending a more stable Persian Gulf.

  IRAN AND THE OLD IRAQ

  During the interwar years, a conservative elite, often composed of landowners and tribal sheikhs, dominated the landscape of Arab politics. The traditional Hashemite monarchy that reigned in Baghdad belonged to this class, as its fears of revolutionary radicalism and Soviet encroachment made it an ally of the West. The common foreign policy outlook, shared institutions, and ties to America’s anti-Communist containment network led to an unprecedented degree of cooperation between Baghdad and Tehran, as both parties were committed to the preservation of the regional status quo.1

  By the 1950s, the Middle East was a changed region. A new middle class had emerged with its own political and economic ambitions that could no longer be confined to the framework conceived by the conservative monarchies. An Arab Cold War had descended on the region, with the pro-Western monarchical regimes being challenged by radical republics professing neutralism abroad and socialism at home. No state embodied this struggle more than Egypt as its dynamic leader, Gamal Abdel Nasser, captured the imagination of the Arab political class. Although typically indifferent to inter-Arab intrigues, the Shah viewed the resistance against Nasserism as a momentous battle. The monarchies of Iran and Iraq once more found themselves on the same side, resisting the same foes and struggling under the same banner.

  The 1958 coup in Iraq, leading to the bloody overthrow of the Hashemite monarchy, dramatically altered the once cordial relations between Iran and Iraq. The new radical officer corps led by Abdul-Karim Qasim loudly proclaimed its pan-Arab mission and proved openly disdainful of the monarchy next door as a relic of a reactionary era. Although in the past national interests had bound the two countries together, ideological discord was the new order of the day. Territorial disagreements, particularly over the disputed Shatt al-Arab waterway, seemed insoluble as the two countries viewed each other with suspicion and fear.

  Iraq’s impulsive ruler, Qasim, now claimed the Iranian province of Khuzestan with its Arab population as “Arabistan” and christened the Persian Gulf as the “Arabian Gulf.” The intricate 1937 treaty detailing arrangements for the mutual use of the Shatt al-Arab waterway were also dismissed by Iraq’s strident nationalists as an intolerable infringement of Arab rights. The new republican regime not only challenged the legitimacy of the Iranian government but also its territorial boundaries. The Iraqi government that sanctioned its power through claims of pan-Arabism and as the self-appointed defender of the larger Arab community viewed its Persian neighbor in distinct ethnic terms. For the new masters of Baghdad, Iran was a stagnant Persian monarchy sustained in its power by Western imperial preference, while for the Shah, the militant Iraqi government’s self-professed identity with the radical Arab bloc, its pro-Soviet inclinations, and its determination to claim the Gulf for the Arab cause was bound to be a threat. The Hashemite monarchy may have had serious differences with Iran, but it did not contest the essential integrity of the Pahlavi regime.

  The arrival of the Ba’athist regime through a bloody coup in 1968 further anguished the Iranian state. The Ba’athist ideology was even more strident in its claim of unifying the mythical Arab community and resisting pro-Western regimes. The Sunni-dominated government also effectively disenfranchised the Shiite and Kurdish majorities and looked abroad for its legitimacy. The Sunnis were dominating Iraq not for crass parochial purposes, the Ba’athists claimed, but for the larger cause of Arab solidarity. The vicissitudes of unstable internal order, the determination of an imperious Sunni populace, and the imperatives of Arab politics fostered an aggressive foreign policy. Baghdad now became the benefactor of a wide variety of leftist and pan-Arab opposition forces in the Gulf and openly appealed to the Arabs who lived in Iran’s oil-rich southern provinces. With its ties to the Soviet Union and its revolutionary outlook, Iraq represented a continued and escalating threat to Iran.

  The ascendance of a radical regime in Baghdad coincided with important changes in Iran’s foreign policy orientation. Rising oil revenues and American benevolence allowed the Shah to nurture his aspiration of creating a powerful military to police the Gulf. An overextended America, struggling in its Vietnam quagmire, was happy to cede this role to the ambitious Persian monarch. After all, the Nixon Doctrine called for arming pliable proxies willing to shoulder the burdens of the Cold War. While the Shah may have been inclined to share the spoils of the Nixon Doctrine with the conservative monarchy of Saudi Arabia and accept a twin-pillar policy, no such deference was yielded to the Ba’athist regime. The Shah signaled his attitude in no uncertain terms, warning his local challengers that if they “do not respect Iran’s legitimate rights in the Persian Gulf, they must expect Iran to show the same attitude toward them.”2

  For the Ba’athist state, with its claims as the guardian of Arabism, Iran’s preeminence constituted a transgression against both its ideological commitments and regional aspirations. Baghdad denounced Iran’s assertions as “illegal ambition in Iraq’s territorial waters and the Arabian Gulf.”3 Iraq’s propaganda once more focused on fomenting uprisings among the Arab-speaking population in Khuzestan. The new Iraqi regime even invoked the sacred cause of resisting Israel, claiming that Iran was working in conjunction with the Jewish state to provoke a crisis in the Gulf as a means of undermining Arab solidarity against Israel.4 In the aftermath of Egypt’s defeat at the hands of Israel during the 1967 war, Iraq sensed a unique opportunity to assume the mantle of Arab leadership and perceived its relations with Iran in a larger Arab context. Border clashes, deportation of Iraqis of Iranian origin, and a strident propaganda campaign now characterized relations between the two erstwhile allies.

  Such conflict was not without its share of victims. By the early 1970s Baghdad was locked into one of its perennial conflicts with its restive Kurdish minority. The cynicism of Iran’s policy was on ample display, as the Shah viewed the Kurdish struggle for autonomy as an effective means of pressuring Iraq into acquiescing to his territorial demands and his quest to assume greater control over the contested Shatt al-Arab waterway. The prevailing imbalance of power and the Iraqi regime’s preoccupation with its internal conflicts forced it to acquiesce to the Algiers Accords in March 1975, granting Iran much of its demands. Having achieved his strategic aims, the Shah brutally cut off his assistance to the Kurds, sacrificing his ally of convenience. Not for the last time, Kurds would find themselves betrayed by an external power pledging friendship and
solidarity.

  By 1979, the mutual ascendance of Saddam Hussein in Iraq and Ayatollah Khomeini in Iran added further fuel to this combustible mix. In essence, both states were now led by dogmatic politicians who were prone to accept great risks in pursuit of their objectives. As both leaders sought to impose their ideological templates on the region, conflict between the two states became nearly inevitable.

  SADDAM’S WAR

  Too often in history, the rise of revolutionary regimes leads to wars and conflict.5 Revolutionaries tend to perceive their ideals as universally applicable and the existing order as necessarily iniquitous. The demarcation between domestic politics and foreign affairs soon blurs, frequently evaporating all together. The cause of revolutionary affirmation mandates the export of the new order, demonstrating its vitality and vigor. More so than any of its predecessors, the Iranian revolution not only exhibited these sentiments, but its particular religious character made its forceful exportation all the more important. As we have seen, Khomeini waged his revolt not just to displace the Shah’s monarchy but also to usher in a new epoch.

  Such a pattern of revolutionary provocation was soon evident as the ayatollahs decried the Ba’athist regime, offering material and moral sanction to its many opponents. A strident secular state seeking to organize the region under the banner of pan-Arabism and allying itself with the atheist Soviet regime was a particular affront to Khomeini. In the initial heady days, when Iran’s euphoric clerics had managed to overthrow a formidable monarchy, the revolution appeared awesome, ferocious, and relentless. In such an atmosphere, caution and restraint did not always guide Tehran’s new rulers.6