Iran Supports America against the Taliban
On 9th September 2001, two young Tunisian professionals with Belgian passports managed to gain permission to interview the elusive Ahmad Shah Massoud. Massoud was the leader of Afghanistan’s Northern Alliance – the group who had managed to fend off the otherwise dominant Taliban from the Panjshir Valley. During the interview both young men exploded bombs, killing Massoud and another Northern Alliance official. Iran’s intelligence services deemed that only Al-Qaeda could pull off such an organised attack.
Two days later America was attacked by Al-Qaeda. Iranians mourned the loss of life and the Iranian government outlawed “death to America” chants. At the time the moderate Mohammad Khatami was the president of Iran who was keen to improve relations with the West.
Al-Qaeda and the Taliban was a common enemy of both Iran and the United States. When America declared a ‘War on Terror’ and planned to strike the Taliban in Afghanistan, a member of Iran’s UN delegation brought a message to American delegates. “Iran was prepared to work unconditionally with the United States on the War on Terror” said Hillary Mann, who was part of the American UN delegation at the time. This was a significant offer as America and Iran had no relations since American embassy staff were taken hostage in Tehran in 1979. The ‘Six Plus Two Group’ was formed to support these discussions and frequently met in New York and Geneva; this group consisted of China, Iran, Pakistan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan plus America and Russia. Iran – according to Mann – was “willing to do what was necessary to ensure that the US military campaign could succeed”.
A one-month heavy bombing campaign in Afghanistan made little progress for the US. Iran became frustrated with the lack of progress and encouraged America to change strategy. Iran advocated that America should formally ally with the Northern Alliance, and they provided crucial intelligence on the locations of key strategic Taliban strongholds. This approach became the basis of America’s military strategy in Afghanistan and on 12th November 2001 the Northern Alliance took the Afghan capital, Kabul. Iran then played a key role in designating a new interim government for Afghanistan.
The "Axis of Evil" Speech
Despite successfully supporting America in their military campaign in Afghanistan, America still had Iran on its list of state sponsors of terror. On 29th January 2002, George Bush said the following in his annual State of the Union address:
“Iran aggressively pursues these weapons [of mass destruction] and exports terror, while an unelected few repress the Iranian people's hope for freedom. States like these, and their terrorist allies, constitute an axis of evil, arming to threaten the peace of the world.”
Bush’s poorly-timed speech instantly destroyed any of the recent improvements in US-Iran relations within Iran. Mohammed Khatami recalled Iranian sentiment after the speech: “During our revolution, relations with America were bad; now they were worse”.
Iran’s Predicament
In the autumn of 2002 The White House was seeking approval from the UN and congress to wage war on Iraq. This caused concern for the Iranian government because it would lead to a significant build-up of American forces on Iran’s western border with Iraq. This would mean that Iran would be essentially surrounded by 250,000 American forces; significant numbers of American forces already existed in Afghanistan and Pakistan in the east and in the Gulf to the south of the country. To make matters worse, the US President was a believer in pre-emptively striking at what he believed to be a threat to US security.
However, Saddam Hussein had been a long-term enemy of Iran and in October 2002 Khatami offered to provide intelligence and advice to the United States to support the removal of Hussein. Iran had close ties with Iraq’s Shia majority and was perfectly placed to provide intelligence before during and after the war to ensure a quick military campaign and help to stabilise the country once Hussein’s Sunni government fell. There were a large number of Iraqi exiles living in Iran and Khatami proposed that some of these people were ideal candidates for a new government in post-Hussein Iraq. This great opportunity was dismissed out-of-hand by the White House.
The Grand Bargain
On 3rd May 2003, two days after Bush had declared “mission accomplished” in Iraq, Sadegh Kharrazi, Iran’s ambassador to France, drafted a roadmap for the normalization of US-Iranian relations. The proposal was reviewed and approved by Iran’s top leaders including Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, President Mohammad Khatami, and Sadegh’s uncle, the Foreign Minister Kamal Kharrazi. It was faxed to the US State Department by Tim Guldimann, who was the Swiss ambassador to Iran and who represented US political interests in Iran in lieu of formal diplomatic relations. This document was referred to by diplomats as the Grand Bargain and included in its proposals were the following:
- Decisive action against all terrorists in Iranian territory (particularly Al-Qaeda)
- Acceptance of much tighter regulation by International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) in exchange for “full access to peaceful nuclear technology.” Also “full transparency for security [assurance] that there are no Iranian endeavors to develop or possess WMD” and adherence to IAEA protocols that would guarantee the IAEA access to any declared or undeclared facility on short notice.
- A significant softening of their stance on Israel involving support of a two-state Palestinian solution and peace with Israel in return for a withdrawal to 1967 lines.
- The withdrawal of Iranian support for Palestinian opposition groups such as Hamas and the conversion of Hezbollah into a peaceful political party.
The fulfilment of the above would surely have been a huge step towards the stabilization of the Middle East. Interestingly, their proposed solution for the Israel and Palestine issue was also in alignment with Barrack Obama’s proposals in 2008. The concerns in the west around Iran’s nuclear program would have been alleviated with full IAEA transparency. As well as the above the document proposed that Iran would provide:
- The “coordination of Iranian influence for activity supporting political stabilization and the establishment of democratic institutions and a nonreligious government” in Iraq.
Remember that this was at a time when Saddam had just been toppled and the US-led Coalition was occupying the Shia majority state of Iraq. Had the US Administration signed-up to this proposal the Coalition would surely have had a far less painful experience in Iraq. The proposal to use Iran’s influence to ensure a secular government in Iraq was would have been an almost miraculous coup for the Coalition – given that the document was approved by the Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei. Another Islamic Republic in the region would have been a disaster for Washington and London’s strategy.
So what was in it for Iran? The obvious benefit was peace with the most powerful military nation on earth; a long-term sworn enemy that had a huge military presence in the region. Peace with the US would also mean that the Israeli threat would be neutralized. But Iran also wanted to ensure a democratically elected government in Iraq. It knew that a Shia-led government would be voted into power in the Shia majority state, thus increasing its sphere of influence in the region and bolstering its security with a new ally next door.
The US State Department immediately rejected the proposal. “We’re not interested in any grand bargain,” the hard-line Undersecretary of State for Arms Control and International Security John Bolton said at the time. Larry Wilkerson, Secretary of State Colin Powell’s chief of staff, later said that the deal was a “non-starter so long as [Dick] Cheney was Vice President and the principal influence on Bush”.
Events in Iraq in the following years reiterated again and again how much of an opportunity was missed with the Grand Bargain. The influence of Iran and the Shia clerics in Iraq cannot be underestimated. Shia militias battled continuously with Sunni insurgents in Baghdad causing ongoing turmoil in the capital. Suicide bombing after suicide bombing has continued to this day, and Baghdad was carved up into Shia, Sunni and Coalition areas. Shia militias infiltrated the new Iraqi police force and military and imposed their own strictly conservative interpretation of Islamic law on the populace. Their dominance in the south of the country around Basra became absolute after frequently and effectively attacking the British forces in the area with powerful bombs manufactured in Iran. Meanwhile a Shia dominated government was voted into power during the elections in the country. Since the beginning of the Iraq War there have been 3,662 hostile-fire deaths of Coalition personnel.
Were all options on the table?
Following the rejection of The Grand Bargain, Iran continued to pursue nuclear technology. Hard-line President Ahmadinejad came into power in late 2005 in an election engineered by the Supreme Council. Ahmadinejad took a stance that was matched the aggression shown by the Bush Administration. Members of the Bush Administration repeatedly stated that they wanted to deal with Iranian nuclear ambitions diplomatically, yet threatened that “all options were on the table” i.e. a military attack on Iran was a possibility.
So were all options really on the table? Perhaps, in the sense that they would all have been discussed. However, a re-run of Iraq or Afghanistan in the form of an invasion and occupation was not a serious option. Iran is a different kettle of fish from those countries and by 2005 the Bush Administration fully grasped the difficulties encountered by the Coalition forces in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Let's compare some stats between the three countries to emphasis how difficult a ground-based military campaign would be in Iran. The population of Iran is more than both Iraq and Afghanistan combined. Between them, Iraq and Afghanistan can muster up around 11 million men that are fit for military service. Iran alone can provide itself 50% more with almost 18 million.
Iran is also in a different league economically from Iraq and Afghanistan. Its economy is almost 8 times larger than Iraq's with a gross domestic product (GDP) of $842 billion. At the time of the invasion of Iraq, its GDP was even lower than it is now, at around $30 billion - approximately 30 times smaller than Iran's current GDP. This is even more impressive given that the United States has had a trade embargo on Iran for 30 years.
On top of this, the geographic conditions in Iran are unfavorable. The country is huge. Its area roughly equals that of the United Kingdom, France, Spain, and Germany combined. It is 2.5 times larger than Afghanistan and almost 4 times the size of Iraq. It is one of the most mountainous countries in the world. It has dense rainforest to the north and barren desert to the east. If the American and British think that dealing with the Taliban is difficult in the mountains of Afghanistan then they haven't seen anything yet.
The Future of US-Iranian Relations
It appears that the intensity of the protests against the recent election has subsided a little in Iran. Barrack Obama has attempted to reach out to Iran in a far more diplomatic manner than his predecessor. His dialogue indicates a softening of approach to Iran by the US Administration:
"The United States wants the Islamic Republic of Iran to take its rightful place in the community of nations. You have that right, but it comes with real responsibilities. And that place cannot be reached through terror or arms, but rather through peaceful actions that demonstrate the true greatness of the Iranian people and civilization."
However, whilst Ahmadinejad is in power in Iran it seems unlikely that this tone would be reciprocated. The best hope of improving relations between the USA and Iran is if Ahmadinejad is forced out or voted out of his current position.
It's possible that the religious leaders at the top of the Iran's theocracy may force Ahmadinejad out in an attempt at self-preservation. Many people in Iran are fed-up with the rampant inflation and the impact of US economic sanctions. A less confrontational leader may appease the populace by improving international relations and therefore increase the life expectancy of the ruling religious elite in the country. The problem is that Ahmadinejad is a populist leader who primarily appeals to the uneducated urban and rural populace. Ironically, whilst Western sanctions restrict the Iranian economy, they also have a derogatory effect on the literacy and education levels in Iran thus feeding nationalist sentiment, fundamentalism and the support-base of politicians like Ahmadinejad.
Alternatively Ahmadinejad may survive until the next election in 2013. The regime's violent clamp-down on recent protests seem to have achieved a short-term result for them. However it has no doubt had an impact on the collective psyche of the Iranian people. This means that there could be a powder-keg atmosphere during the next elections. If the people get a hint that anything may be amiss when it comes to their vote then it's unlikely to be tolerated. Protests would turn violent and another revolution could occur.
If Iran ends up with a new moderate president whilst Barrack Obama is in office then there is hope of the two countries achieving an amicable agreement. It's unlikely that Obama would make the same mistake as Bush and reject another Grand Bargain...
1 comments:
well written
Post a Comment