WASHINGTON, 21 November 2004 — A real live American is a rare find in Iran these days. At an official “Death to America’’ rally in Tehran last year, a horde of giggling chador-clad high school girls asked for my autograph. Like many other Iranians I talked to during the 18 months I spent working there, they were tired of the regime’s rants about the “Great Satan’’ and greeted me like a long-lost cousin. Our absence has made the Iranian heart grow fonder, though that emotion reflects resentment toward the clerics at the top more than innate enthusiasm for America. Despite widespread frustration with the regime’s repressive methods and rank hypocrisy, no organized opposition movement or leader has emerged to harness public anger. Contrary to what some neoconservatives might tell you, Iran is not on the verge of revolution. As the prospect of a nuclear-armed Iran looms — if the Bush administration’s warnings last week turn out to be correct — the United States will have to face that reality. Pretending otherwise only strengthens the hand of the ruling clerics. Last week, Iran managed to buy time by negotiating a deal with Britain, France and Germany in which it promised to suspend uranium enrichment in return for avoiding a referral to the UN Security Council. A similar, less detailed agreement brokered a year ago with the Europeans unraveled in a matter of months. Given allegations last week that Iran may be adapting missiles to carry nuclear weapons and secretly enriching weapons-grade uranium at a secret facility, this latest agreement with the European trio may not last long either. The United States will in all likelihood come to regret its decision to stand by, shaking its head disapprovingly while European initiatives falter. With Iran cleverly playing off divisions between Europe and America, it has become clear that only a united approach can concentrate minds in Tehran. Indulging fantasies about toppling the regime or seductive plans for unilateral action are merely excuses for avoiding the hard work required to forge an international consensus. Iran’s clerics would exploit any US go-it-alone response by stirring up national feeling and seeking out sympathetic treatment from other governments.
One sure way to derail the cause of democracy would be heavy-handed US action. Iranians retain a deep sense of national pride, and a clumsy covert operation or a stray bomb from the United States would be a gift to the mullas. Air raids or other intervention of this kind would turn the focus away from the regime’s failures and revive the idea of America as the villainous imperial meddler.
The troubled American-led occupation of Iraq next door has already given the regime a rationale for cracking down on dissent at home and painting its critics as traitors. Ask members of the political establishment in Tehran about US warnings, and you hear confident answers. They speak about Europe’s keen interest in the Iranian market, and hint that Iran could make life much more difficult for the United States in Iraq. Military or covert action against Iran’s nuclear sites would bring swift, unprecedented retaliation against American troops next door, the possible mining of shipping lanes in Iran’s backyard — the Strait of Hormuz — and yet another anti-American backlash in the Islamic world.
The Bush administration wants the issue referred to the UN Security Council. But Iran is gambling that France, Russia and China will oppose any genuine sanctions. A US trade embargo that dates back to the 1980s has damaged Iran but never crippled it. Staking out more unilateral ground would simply play into the regime’s hands. Only trans-Atlantic unity provides hope of heading off Iran’s secretive nuclear experiments and a potential lethal arms race across the region. That will require the United States to start speaking directly to Iran, without concessions or conditions, in the same direct way we spoke to the Soviets during the Cold War. Holding talks with Iran would not mean forgiving the regime’s crimes at home or abroad, but it would demand the kind of tough-minded, skillful diplomacy that ultimately contained the Soviet threat. A limited dialogue would provide a way of discussing the nuclear issue without having to resolve myriad grievances and lingering disputes.
If the Bush administration can take a multilateral approach to North Korea’s nuclear project, then why not with Iran? Whatever strategy prevails, the United States has to face reality.
Those Iranian school girls will stop asking for American autographs if US bombs start falling. And although the girls wish us well for now, the leadership is already anticipating unilateral American action with a certain amount of relish. If the Iranian regime were to be confronted instead with one unequivocal, international voice, it would find itself with limited room to maneuver.
