Nuke row: Just what is it that Iran is doing wrong?
By Alexander Hamilton
"Anyone who knows Iran knows two things. One is that there is nothing which excites Iranians as much as getting locked into hard bargaining over something they sense the other party wants. The second is that, of all Middle Eastern countries, Iran is the most nationalistic. Challenge them over what they regard as their sovereign rights and you will get head-on collision.
"The international community has managed to get sucked into the former and locked into the latter. There was no need for this. Nor is there any need for the confrontation to spiral out of control now, with dire warnings of referral to the UN Security Council, the imposition of sanctions and the scarcely veiled threat of military action, if not by the US then Israel. All this will do is to stiffen the resolve of the Iranians, undermine the authority of the United Nations and offer proof to those within Iran who argue the need for a mightier military to face down a sea of enemies. What it won’t do is to get the Iranians to back down on their present course of enriching uranium.
"And why shouldn't they? Before President Bush, together with Chirac and Jack Straw and even the Russians, get too sanctimonious and before the international community gets too carried away with implicit threats it is worth asking: Just what is it that Iran is doing wrong?.
"Tehran’s case is that, as a signatory of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, it is perfectly entitled to pursue an active program of nuclear power. It is equally entitled, with inspection by the UN, to develop uranium enrichment so long as it is for peaceful purposes. The US and the European case is not so much that they quarrel with Iran’s rights, although they believe that Iran deliberately disguised its uranium enrichment ambitions for years in breach of its treaty obligations. ...
"Iran will go down the enrichment route. Of that the international community needs to be clear. It won’t accept anything less, certainly not after what it regards as the half-hearted offers of the Europeans to make it give up. It also needs to face up to how little it can do to stop it. Iran is too important an energy supplier to be isolated and too proud to be bullied. Invade them and you will create a xenophobic uprising, drive them into a corner and they will double their efforts to gain military might.
"The international community has a lever in that Iran is prepared for stringent inspections to make sure of its peaceful purposes. It should pursue that control for all it is worth. At the same time we should do what we should have done from the start, and have so singularly failed to do at the urgings of Washington and Jerusalem, and that is to treat it as a regional power of individual strength and worth. You may not like the regime (indeed it is pretty dislikeable) but Iran is a player in the Middle East. And in the wreckage of President Bush’s wider Iraq policy, it’s time we engaged with it as such."
Source (originally in Independent, by subscription)
Tagged: iran, nukes, nuclear, usa, un
"Anyone who knows Iran knows two things. One is that there is nothing which excites Iranians as much as getting locked into hard bargaining over something they sense the other party wants. The second is that, of all Middle Eastern countries, Iran is the most nationalistic. Challenge them over what they regard as their sovereign rights and you will get head-on collision.
"The international community has managed to get sucked into the former and locked into the latter. There was no need for this. Nor is there any need for the confrontation to spiral out of control now, with dire warnings of referral to the UN Security Council, the imposition of sanctions and the scarcely veiled threat of military action, if not by the US then Israel. All this will do is to stiffen the resolve of the Iranians, undermine the authority of the United Nations and offer proof to those within Iran who argue the need for a mightier military to face down a sea of enemies. What it won’t do is to get the Iranians to back down on their present course of enriching uranium.
"And why shouldn't they? Before President Bush, together with Chirac and Jack Straw and even the Russians, get too sanctimonious and before the international community gets too carried away with implicit threats it is worth asking: Just what is it that Iran is doing wrong?.
"Tehran’s case is that, as a signatory of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, it is perfectly entitled to pursue an active program of nuclear power. It is equally entitled, with inspection by the UN, to develop uranium enrichment so long as it is for peaceful purposes. The US and the European case is not so much that they quarrel with Iran’s rights, although they believe that Iran deliberately disguised its uranium enrichment ambitions for years in breach of its treaty obligations. ...
"Iran will go down the enrichment route. Of that the international community needs to be clear. It won’t accept anything less, certainly not after what it regards as the half-hearted offers of the Europeans to make it give up. It also needs to face up to how little it can do to stop it. Iran is too important an energy supplier to be isolated and too proud to be bullied. Invade them and you will create a xenophobic uprising, drive them into a corner and they will double their efforts to gain military might.
"The international community has a lever in that Iran is prepared for stringent inspections to make sure of its peaceful purposes. It should pursue that control for all it is worth. At the same time we should do what we should have done from the start, and have so singularly failed to do at the urgings of Washington and Jerusalem, and that is to treat it as a regional power of individual strength and worth. You may not like the regime (indeed it is pretty dislikeable) but Iran is a player in the Middle East. And in the wreckage of President Bush’s wider Iraq policy, it’s time we engaged with it as such."
Source (originally in Independent, by subscription)
Tagged: iran, nukes, nuclear, usa, un
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