Russian President Dmitry Medvedev meets today with President Obama in the Oval Office, in advance of the two leaders’ participation in the G7/8 and G20 summits in Canada this coming weekend.  Iran will undoubtedly be an important topic on the agenda for Medvedev’s meeting with Obama.  Last week, U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates described Russian policy toward Iran as “schizophrenic” (see, here).  As we noted then, rather than describing Russia’s Iran policy as “schizophrenic”, we see Russia’s Iran policy as an ongoing attempt by decision-makers in Moscow to balance among multiple interests vis-à-vis the Islamic Republic.  But the way in which Russia strikes this balance has shifted in some significant ways over the last year or so.  As a result, Iranian policymakers and analysts are re-evaluating the benefits and difficulties of the Islamic Republic’s relationship with Russia.  All of this reinforces the enormous strategic opportunity that the United States has vis-à-vis Iran—but, unfortunately, there is no evidence that the Obama Administration understands this or is prepared to act on it.   

Russia’s Iran policy 

Since the end of the Cold War and the demise of the Soviet Union, the Islamic Republic has worked hard to cultivate a strategic partnership with post-Soviet Russia.  Of course, for many Iranians, there is heavy historical “baggage” attached to relations with Russia/the Soviet Union.  But, from an Iranian perspective, Russia is the “great power” that has been most intent on finding ways to counter-balance American hegemony in the post-Cold War world—an important strategic consideration given ongoing U.S. hostility toward the Islamic Republic. 

From a Russian perspective, Iran has been a market for sales of conventional weaponry (though never as large as some other markets for Russian arms, such as China and India) and civil nuclear technology (epitomized in Russia’s role at Bushehr).  Iran has also been a constructive partner for Russia on regional security issues in Central and South Asia, taking what could be described as “pro-Russian” positions on a number of regional conflicts (e.g., Tajikistan, Nagorno-Karabakh, Chechnya, and Afghanistan) since the early days of the post-Cold War period. 

In addition, Russia has sought to present itself as a potential partner in the development of Iran’s energy resources.  In 1997, Russia’s state-owned Gazprom became one of the first foreign energy companies to invest in the development of the massive South Pars gas field (in a joint venture with Total and Petronas).  After Vladimir Putin became President of the Russian Federation in 2001, Gazprom and the Islamic Republic’s Ministry of Petroleum formed a joint committee to “coordinate” Iranian gas exports with Russia.  The Russian government provided early political support for a planned gas pipeline from Iran to Pakistan and India, while Gazprom offered technical support and even indicated its willingness to help finance the project.   

Just a few years ago, Iranian-Russian relations seemed to be headed toward even closer strategic cooperation.  (For example, in what seemed at the time an important symbolic statement, in 2007 Putin became the first non-Muslim head of state or government to be received by the Islamic Republic’s Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.)  But, since Dmitry Medvedev replaced Putin as President of the Russian Federation in 2008 (with Putin becoming Prime Minister), the limits on Russia’s willingness to act in strategic partnership with the Islamic Republic have become increasingly apparent. 

It has become clear, for example, that Moscow’s willingness to support Iran’s emergence as a gas exporter is ultimately conditioned by Russia’s own position as the world’s leading producer and exporter of natural gas—a position which, among other things, gives Russia an especially strong interest in forestalling direct competition with prospective Iranian gas exports to European energy markets, where Gazprom is established as the leading foreign gas supplier. 

More broadly, Moscow’s still compelling need to balance its interest in closer ties to Tehran against other important foreign policy interests—including relations with Washington—has regularly frustrated Iranian efforts to maximize the strategic and economic gains from cooperation with Russia.  Over the last 20 years, Russia has been willing on a number of occasions to curtail its arms exports to Iran in exchange for concessions from the United States.  Likewise, in response to American pressure/blandishments, Russia stepped back from commitments to provide the Islamic Republic with uranium enrichment and reprocessing technologies.   

Russia’s foreign policy “balancing act” is also reflected in its approach to the Iranian nuclear issue.  Since the invasion of Iraq in 2003, Russian leaders have been intent on constraining a unilateral resort to force against Iranian nuclear targets by the United States (or Israel).  To this end, Moscow has a strong interest in keeping the Iranian nuclear issue in the United Nations Security Council—where Russia, as a permanent member, has considerable influence—rather than having the United States deal with the issue primarily through an ad hoc “coalition of the willing” or “coalition of the like-minded” that would almost certainly not include Russia.  For this reason, Moscow has never been prepared to use its veto to give Iran “blanket” protection from Security Council sanctions.  Instead, on four occasions—most recently this month—Russia has supported resolutions imposing sanctions on Iran over its nuclear program, while also working diplomatically to water down the measures actually authorized and ensure that nothing in these resolutions could be plausibly construed by Washington as authorizing the use of force. 

In this regard, it seems doubtful that Russia genuinely wants to see a diplomatic resolution to the nuclear issue, which would almost certainly go hand in hand with a substantial measure of U.S.-Iranian rapprochement.  While Russia clearly opposes U.S. (or Israeli) military strikes against Iranian nuclear targets, Moscow has never pushed Washington to offer Tehran more fulsome security guarantees or other strategic incentives that could facilitate productive nuclear discussions—even though Russian diplomats believe that such offers are essential for diplomatic progress.  As Russian diplomats have explained to us, Washington’s failure to pursue effective diplomacy with Tehran creates a “workable paradigm” for Russia:  the United States may engage just enough to forestall a destabilizing military confrontation with Iran, but not enough to achieve real rapprochement—which could, among other things, undermine Moscow’s strategic value to Tehran and unleash Iranian gas to compete directly with Russian gas exports, in Europe and elsewhere. 

To the extent that Moscow has proposed specific solutions to the nuclear issue since 2003, these solutions have emphasized Iranian participation in multilateral fuel-cycle centers—centers that would be based, conveniently enough, in Russia.  Russia’s support for the October 2009 “Baradei” proposal regarding international arrangements to refuel the Tehran Research Reactor was similarly self-serving:  the proposal would have given Russia an enhanced role in providing “value-added” nuclear products while simultaneously circumscribing the development of Iran’s indigenous fuel-cycle capabilities. 

Re-evaluating Iran’s approach to Russia 

Iranian policymakers and analysts are, of course, well aware of these dynamics.  A number of recent developments in Russia’s Iran policy—e.g., Moscow’s willingness to move ahead with a fourth round of UN sanctions against Iran even after Brazil and Turkey had brokered a similar fuel-swap deal in Tehran, Russian officials’ vacillation on the prospective transfer of S-300 anti-aircraft missiles to Iran, etc.—appear to be prompting a re-evaluation of the Islamic Republic’s posture toward Russia. 

In this regard, we were struck by a recent interview on Iranian-Russian relations with Kayhan Barzegar, as reported in several Iranian news outlets; see here, here, and here.  Kayhan is a brilliant scholar and foreign policy analyst who is currently on the faculty at Iran’s Islamic Azad University; he is also a senior research fellow at the Center for Strategic Research and the Center for Middle East Strategic Studies (both in Tehran) and maintains an affiliation with the Kennedy School’s Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs.  (We have previously highlighted some of Kayhan’s work on the nuclear issue, see here and on Iranian views of the regional balance of power in the Middle East and Persian Gulf, see here on www.TheRaceForIran.com.)  Kayhan’s observations about Iranian-Russian relations are certainly worthy of consideration on their own merits, but they may also offer a window into current discussions and thinking about Russia in Iranian foreign policy circles.     

Kayhan focuses on the different perspectives of President Medvedev and his advisers, on the one hand, and elements in Russia’s national security apparatus (the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Ministry of Defense, the National Security Council) and Putin, on the other, regarding relations with Iran.  In his view, Medvedev and elites around him believe that an essential condition for maintaining power is the success of Russia’s economy.  This requires closer relations with the United States and the West, which incentivizes Russian leaders to accept at least some of the demands that Washington and its allies have put to Moscow, including with regard to Iran’s nuclear program.  By drawing closer to the West, these leaders can improve Russia’s “economic and strategic reach” to the world. 

This line of analysis certainly seems plausible, particularly in the wake of the global financial crisis.  Just this week, Igor Sechin—Putin’s former right-hand man at the Kremlin, chairman of Rosneft, and a leading figure among the siloviki (former Soviet intelligence officers who assumed a dominant role in the reassertion of state influence over Russia’s economy during Putin’s presidency) told The Financial Times that “the [global financial] crisis exposed the vulnerabilities of the Russian economy in its dependence on certain types of raw materials.  This cannot help but concern us”. 

Last month, we met with Russian Deputy Prime Minister Sergei Ivanov—a close Putin ally—during his visit to Washington; among other things, Ivanov was clearly pleased by the Obama Administration’s decision to revive the “123” nuclear cooperation agreement with Russia, which could set up Russia for significant new international business opportunities in the civil nuclear arena.  (This agreement had been concluded while George W. Bush was in the White House, but then mothballed after Russia sent troops into Georgia.) 

In a special supplement to The Washington Post prepared by Rossiyskaya Gazeta and published today, the strategic context for Medvedev’s trip to the United States this week is described very candidly: 

“It is unusual for Medvedev to make the nation’s capital his second stop on a trip.  His first stop this week is San Francisco, and more precisely, Silicon Valley.  Medvedev is to meet with leading American entrepreneurs interested in opening or expanding business with Russia.  And for the first time in this relationship, we may see a focus on technological cooperation rather than investment in oil and gas.  His travel plans reflect the essence of his main agenda, namely innovative and technological breakthroughs for the Russian economy and reduced dependence on fossil fuel, in order to catch up with the developed world. 

There are no significant obstacles for such an agenda.  First, the current U.S. administration declares a “pragmatic” approach in world affairs.  This means it is no longer a priority to irritate Moscow over sensitive issues, such as human rights or democratic values, which were among the favorite topics of the previous administration.  Second, Obama’s administration pays less attention to the post-Soviet neighbors…A change in focus on these issues has helped the United States create a more workable relationship with Russia and eliminate the excessive passion that characterized the previous decade…the greatest evidence for this approach was demonstrated very recently when the United Nations Security Council voted for a new resolution enacting tougher sanctions against Iran, which the United States had long discussed with China and Russia.  Russia may now expect something in return and, considering Medvedev’s agenda, this might be an appeal for better economic cooperation, particularly in technologies.” 

So, for the time being, Russia seems to need the United States more, and—given that “the Obama administration pays less attention to the post-Soviet neighbors”—to need Iran a little bit less.  Of course, Russia retains a significant interest in preserving cooperative ties to Iran.  Iranian diplomats have said that, after a public exchange of critical remarks by senior Russian and Iranian officials in May 2010, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, took a conciliatory tone in a telephone conversation with his Iranian counterpart, Manouchehr Mottaki.  Putin and other Russian officials have also publicly reaffirmed Russia’s commitment to bring the Bushehr nuclear power plant on line later this year. 

Likewise, the Islamic Republic retains an interest in preserving the most productive relationship with Russia that it can.  As Barzegar points out, there is still a “logic” of “mutual need” between the two countries.  Russia remains an important strategic actor and a permanent member of the Security Council with veto power; moreover, Iran has a continued interest in cooperation with Russia on nuclear energy and access to advanced defensive weapons.  In this regard, an Iranian parliamentarian who sits on the majlis’s national security committee said earlier this week that “Russia and China actually voted (for the sanctions) out of empathy…Foreign Ministry officials have talked with Russian officials and believe that these two countries voted (in this manner) to prevent more severe action against Iran”.  (In the immediate aftermath of the sanctions vote, some parliamentarians had called for a reassessment of Iranian relations with Russia and China; it would seem that these calls are being decisively rebutted.)          

But the structural limits of Russian willingness to cooperate strategically with Iran have been underscored.  As Barzegar notes, the interest of much of the Russian elite in establishing a truly independent national strategy and global position for Russia is a “long-term” goal.  Barzegar also notes that Russia—like the other veto-wielding permanent members of the Security Council—felt “threatened” by the Joint Declaration which Brazil and Turkey negotiated with Iran last month.  This is an extremely important observation, in our view. 

Russia’s willingness to move ahead in the Security Council with sanctions reflected, at least in part, its interests in defending what Russian elites see as their country’s “great power” prerogatives.  Russian officials were uncomfortable with the Iran-Turkey-Brazil deal not on substantive terms, but because the Joint Declaration represented a potential weakening of the political monopoly that the recognized nuclear weapons states—which also happen to be the five permanent members of the Security Council—exercise with regard to what are described in the United Nations Charter as matters of “international peace and security”.

The Russian position on the nuclear issue underscores a bigger reality:  Moscow is fundamentally uneasy about the Islamic Republic’s emergence as a genuine regional power on the borders of the Russian Federation and other parts of what Russian officials still describe as the “post-Soviet space”.  Gates’ claim that Putin, while still President of the Russian Federation, told him that Iran is the single biggest security threat facing Russia—even if accurately reported—surely reflects a deliberate exaggeration on Putin’s part.  Nevertheless, both Putin and Medvedev seem to like having the Islamic Republic kept “in a box”.

Because of these constraints, Barzegar argues that Russia (and China) are, at best, “short term solutions” for Iran, because these countries accept the rules and order of the existing international system, which largely benefit American interests.  (For a fuller statement of Barzegar’s views on China, see here. 

While we believe that China is becoming, over time, a more substantial strategic option for the Islamic Republic (certainly more substantial than Russia), Kayhan’s argument reinforces an important theme in our analysis:  a critical mass of Iranian political and policymaking elites, cutting across the Islamic Republic’s factional spectrum, continues to recognize that their country has basic national security and foreign policy needs which can only be met—or, only optimally met—through rapprochement with the United States. 

To be sure, Iranian leaders (including the Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Khamenei) evidence deep skepticism about U.S. intentions regarding the Islamic Republic—an understandable posture, given the history of U.S. policy toward Iran and Tehran’s frustrating experience with attempts at outreach to the United States.  Political and policymaking elites in Washington who insist that it is incumbent on Iranian leaders to make, up front, substantial concessions addressing U.S. concerns in order to demonstrate their bona fides about engagement will not accomplish anything positive through such insistence.  (Given the historical track record and the imbalance in military capabilities between Iran and the United States, Iranian leaders need to know, up front, that Washington is serious about a genuine realignment of U.S.-Iranian relations, and is prepared to treat the Islamic Republic with respect as a fully sovereign state.) 

As President Medvedev arrives in Washington, it would be a waste for the Obama Administration to view the difficulties in Iranian-Russian relations primarily as an opening to bargain for a few more tactical concessions from Moscow on Iran-related issues.  Instead, President Obama and his senior advisers should view these difficulties as further confirmation of the real strategic opportunity that rapprochement with the Islamic Republic would represent for the United States.     

–Flynt Leverett and Hillary Mann Leverett

Western analysts and policymakers need to rethink their basic calculations about the Islamic Republic’s domestic politics.  This rethinking should start with a recognition that the Green movement is not the future of Iranian politics; in fact, it’s not even the future of what at least used to be called the “reform movement”.  By sticking with the “conventional wisdom” about Iranian politics in the West—which has been proved wrong at virtually every turn in recent years—Western analysts and policymakers are missing two critically important trends: 

–First, the Green movement still cannot make up its mind about what it wants. 

–Second, Iranian “principalists” have cultivated a younger generation of political leaders to take them through coming parliamentary and presidential election cycles; “reformists” have not done this.      

On the Green movement’s intellectual coherence:  Karroubi’s most recent statement, published on his website on June 20, extends his previous criticism of what he describes as the “vote scandal” and illegitimate outcome in last year’s presidential election, as well as abuses by the security forces and judiciary; the statement goes on to denounce what Karroubi characterizes as an extraordinary arrogation of power under the rubric of velayat-e-faqih (jurisprudential leadership).  But there is very little that is “actionable” in his statement. 

Mousavi’s statement, published by his website on June 15 and available in English translation here, has been depicted more positively in some Western media reports as a “political charter” that “attempts, for the first time, to unite the opposition movement behind a clear set of goals”.  This is inaccurate. 

Mousavi himself published a statement on January 1, 2010, ostensibly commenting on the Ashura protests that had occurred five days previously (for the original Farsi text and an English translation, see here).  This statement included a five-point “solution to the current problems and present crisis” that was widely hailed at the time by Western journalists and commentators as a “manifesto” for the Green movement.  A few days later, five expatriate Iranian intellectuals (Abdolali Bazargan, Akbar Ganji, Mohsen Kadivar, Ataollah Mohajerani, and Abdolkarim Soroush) published a ten-point program—it even included the word “manifesto” in its title—which was also widely acclaimed in the West (for an English translation of this document, see here.  Then, Robin Wright somehow managed to amalgamate these two documents with a third—an open letter from 88 professors—to adduce a kind of composite “opposition manifesto”, presenting “sweeping demands” that “would change the face of Iran”. 

But, in fact, these “manifestos” are irreconcilable in important respects.  Mousavi’s January 2010 statement posits what has been described as a “civil rights movement” agenda for the Greens—an agenda emphasizing the release of “political prisoners”, greater press and media freedom, a new election law/process, and allowing public demonstrations and the formation of political parties.        

By contrast, the manifesto from the five expatriates is a much more radical document.  It was, in fact, issued after Mousavi’s January 1 statement, amid widespread perceptions in Iran and among Iranian expatriates that Mousavi was “backing off”.  One of the five signatories (Soroush) gave an interview in which he explained that “the five of us thought that because we are close enough to the leaders of the movement—Mir-Hossein Mousavi, Mehdi Karroubi and Mohammad Khatami—and know their demands, we should start drafting a manifesto or statement about the Green Movement.  So we started drafting, and then Mousavi’s statement was issued.  Since we are living outside the country, don’t have to fear [the government] and know what is in the mind of the people, we decided to publish our own statement to make clear what Mousavi’s intentions and goals of the Green Movement are”. 

In their manifesto, though, the five expatriates articulate a set of “optimal demands” for the Green movement that go well beyond anything that Mousavi, Karroubi, and Khatami have actually proposed.  These “optimal demands” include:  Ahmadinejad’s resignation as President of the Islamic Republic and the holding of new presidential elections, abolition of the Guardian Council’s power to vet candidates for elective office, establishment of a new election commission including “representatives of the opposition and protestors”, barring the use of Friday prayers for the issuance of statements and “orders” by the government, and making all high offices elective and subject to term limits. 

In this regard, it is worth noting that at least one of the signatories of the expatriates’ manifesto (Ganji) is a long-time advocate of secular democracy in Iran; another (Kadivar) is a staunch critic of the idea and practice of velayat-e-faqih; yet another (Soroush) advocates a model of “religious democracy” which would effectively dismantle the Islamic Republic.  While, in their statement, the five signatories stop short of an explicit call to replace the Islamic Republic with a secularized alternative, Soroush described the manifesto as a first stage; in the “next stage”, the Movement “may demand a redrafting of the constitution”.     

Here, in a nutshell, is the Green movement’s essential intellectual problem, as we described it in a January 5, 2010 article in The New York Times:  “Beyond expressing inchoate discontent, what does the current ‘opposition’ want?  It is no longer championing Mr. Mousavi’s presidential candidacy; Mr. Mousavi himself has now redefined his agenda as ‘national reconciliation’.  Some protestors seem to want expanded personal freedoms and interaction with the rest of the world, but have not comprehensive agenda.  Others—who have received considerable Western press coverage—have taken to calling for the Islamic Republic’s replacement with an (ostensibly secular) ‘Iranian Republic’.”                 

Mr. Mousavi’s latest utterance certainly does not resolve this fundamental tension between the Green movement’s “reformist” and “counter-revolutionary” currents.  Mousavi’s June 15 statement is both longer and sharper in tone than his January 1 statement.  In his most recent message, Mousavi goes beyond criticizing the current Iranian government and the conduct of the judiciary and security forces to highlight what he describes as the “corruption” of a “totalitarian” system—e.g., by asking “who dares to open investigations into the centers of power regarding the great ‘privatizations’ based on Article 44 of the Constitution to expose this great monopolization of our economy”. 

But Mousavi also spends far more words in the June 15 statement than in his January 1 statement defending his loyalty (and the loyalty of those in the Green movement) to the legacy of Imam Khomeini, the Iranian revolution, and the Islamic Republic.  Just as the reform movement of earlier days tried to do, Mousavi seeks to depict the Green movement as the true heirs of Khomeini’s legacy—it is, in Mousavi’s presentation, those who oppose the Green movement who are departing from Khomeini’s principles.  Furthermore, in his June 15 statement, Mousavi underscores to a much greater extent than his January 1 statement his commitment and that of the Green movement to Iran’s independence and the full exercise of its national sovereignty, without being subject to foreign influence.  (It is a sign of how badly Mousavi is losing the “PR war” inside Iran that he now feels obliged to emphasize these things so strongly.) 

Neither in June 2010 nor in January 2010 does Mousavi make any statement that remotely suggests he wants to do away with the Islamic Republic—he remains a “reformist”, not a “counter-revolutionary”.  Indeed, Mousavi argues that the Green movement is “an extension of the Iranian people’s quest for freedom, social justice and national sovereignty, which had been previously manifested in the Constitutional Revolution, the Oil Nationalization Movement and the Islamic Revolution”.  Alongside a lot of rhetoric about the Green movement’s “identity”, “roots”, “values”, and “goals” (to be “a purifier and reformer of the course taken in the Islamic Republic after the Revolution” and to ensure “respect for the people’s votes and opinions”), the actual plan of action put forward in the June 15 statement is remarkably mild: 

“[T]he goals of the Green Movement can only be realized by: strengthening civil society, expanding the space available for social dialogue, increasing awareness, [facilitating] the free of circulation of information, [encouraging] the active participation of [various] parties and associations, and generating a [liberal environment] for intellectuals as well as social and political activists who are loyal to national interests. The achievement of these goals requires an emphasis on common demands, which will facilitate collaboration and coordination among various members of the Green Movement who, despite their own unique identities, have accepted the inherent pluralism of the movement and have gathered side by side under its umbrella.”

But the reformist, “civil rights movement” agenda no longer defines the Green movement—if it ever really did.  The movement’s “counter-revolutionary” current—which is the current that is so enthusiastically supported in the West—has trumped the “reformist” current, at least in popular perceptions inside Iran.  That is one reason why the Green movement’s base of popular support has declined so sharply over the past year—because, as we wrote in our New York Times article, “polling after the [June 12, 2009 presidential] election and popular reaction to the Ashura protests [on December 27, 2009] suggest that most Iranians are unmoved, if not repelled, by calls for the Islamic Republic’s abolition”.  Even Kadivar, in an interview after the five expatriates’ manifesto was published, acknowledged that “the majority of Iranians has no desire for a second revolution, thirty years after the last one”.    

Confusion about the Green movement’s objectives—along with a series of strategic and tactical mistakes—has marginalized both Mousavi and Karroubi.  In Iran today, it is not hard to find reformists/Mousavi supporters who complain that the Green movement was “hijacked” by elements with a more radical—and seemingly foreign-supported—agenda.  As a result, reformist politicians who want a future in Iranian politics are distancing themselves from the movement. 

Confusion about the Green movement’s objectives is abundantly reflected in analyses by pro-Green Western commentators.  Robin Wright noted in January that, while the movement is not yet a full-fledged “counter-revolution”, it is “headed in that direction”—an assessment we contested at the time and which is now increasingly acknowledged as an unrealistic description of the movement’s actual political impact.  On the other hand, Austrian scholar Walter Posch goes out of his way to stress the movement’s “Khomeinist” character.  Green movement partisans do not like it when we point this out, but the movement’s intellectual incoherence is an important factor in its by-now undeniable decline. 

On generational politics:  Publication of the Mousavi and Karroubi statements inadvertently highlights another important long-term reality about contemporary Iranian politics.  Over the last decade, on the conservative side of the Islamic Republic’s political spectrum, there has been a deliberately engineered process of succession in the upper echelons of Iran’s principalist factions.  This process of succession has effectively transferred leadership of these factions from an older generation of clerics to a younger generation of laymen who “came of age” not during the Iranian revolution but fighting in the Iran-Iraq war.  The goal of this transition was to make conservative political forces more electorally competitive with reformists, who dominated the Islamic Republic’s presidential and parliamentary elections from the mid 1990s until the 2004 parliamentary election and the 2005 presidential election. 

A comparable process of generational succession has yet to take place in the upper echelons of the Islamic Republic’s reform movement.  Since President Khatami left office in 2005, reformists have been in disarray, and ambivalence about the legacy of Khatami’s presidency continues to undermine their political prospects.  Above all, the reformists’ political difficulties are reflected in the absence of an obvious successor to Khatami.  Clearly, neither Mousavi nor Karroubi can fulfill this role.   

Thus, the ongoing political competition in the Islamic Republic between reformists and conservatives is more complicated than most Western analysts and commentators recognize.  On the one hand, Iranian voters seem to like some parts of the reformist agenda.  But reformists, at this point, lack an effective standard-bearer for that agenda.  Reformists also suffer from perceptions that they are not deeply engaged with bread-and-butter issues of primary concern to many lower-class and even middle-class voters, and that they did not really “deliver” on their agenda when in charge of both the presidency and the parliament. 

On the other hand, important parts of the conservative “platform” also appeal to Iranian voters.  But, in contrast to their reformist opponents, the principalists have cultivated younger politicians who are effective representatives of their message.  As we think about the future of Iranian politics, these realities leave the reformist camp at a real disadvantage.  Western analysts and policy makers have yet to come to grips with this.       

–Flynt Leverett and Hillary Mann Leverett

Earlier this week, ForeignPolicy.com published a remarkable story, “Neda Lives”, by its associate editor, Cameron Abadi.  While, from the title, it seems evident what the article is about, in fact, it is about an extraordinary case of mistaken identity.  Abadi’s article is apparently not the first time this story has been reported.  Some journalists picked it up last summer—but it is still a remarkable (and cautionary) tale.  We append a few excerpts from Abadi’s article below: 

“Neda Soltani is the ordinary Iranian woman whose image spread last summer in an instant around the world.  She’s a symbol of the brutality of the Iranian regime and the resilience of Iran’s movement for democracy.

She’s also still alive.

A woman named Neda did indeed die last summer on the streets of Tehran, gunned down by members of an Iranian militia.  Her full name was Neda Agha-Soltan.  But mixed in with the tragic footage of that Neda’s death, broadcast around the world in a viral video that galvanized world opinion against the Iranian regime, was a compelling Facebook snapshot of a smiling young beauty in a flowered headscarf.

Her name was Neda, too—Neda Soltani…

Until last year, Neda Soltani was a teaching assistant for English literature at Tehran’s Islamic Azad University, where she was doing graduate work on feminine symbolism in the work of Joseph Conrad.  She wasn’t a supporter of the regime, but she also didn’t belong to any sort of active opposition group, even in the heady days after the disputed election.  She was focused on her academic career above all else; while Iranians were marching in the streets, she was correcting her thesis.  She led the prosaic life of Tehran’s silent apolitical majority.  “I worked for 10 long years to get my position at the university,” she told Germany’s Sueddeutsche Zeitung in February.  “I was earning my own money, I had friends, I would go out and I had fun.”

All that changed on June 20 of last year, when a choppy video appeared on YouTube depicting the gruesome and chaotic death of a young Iranian woman…The process began innocuously enough, resting on a foundation of journalism’s most basic building block: competition for a scoop.  Working only with the first name heard on the YouTube video, international news organizations raced one another to unearth more information on the young women who died on camera.  Forgoing fact checks, editors in New York and London allowed small details to get lost in translation as they communicated with their reporters on the ground:  “Agha-Soltan” lost its hyphen, “Agha” was dropped entirely, or “Soltan” picked up an “i”… 

That’s where Facebook comes in.  On June 21, eager Green Movement supporters decided to dedicate a page on the social networking site to the “Angel of Iran.”  Serendipitously, the martyr herself had a personal Facebook from which they could borrow her portrait.  Framed as a standard passport shot, the photo showed an attractive young woman with a relaxed and innocent smile who wore a head scarf that revealed several inches of dark brown hair.  It was a perfectly adequate resource for activists looking to inspire sympathy—except for the fact that the likeness, like the Facebook page from which it was taken, belonged to Neda Soltani, the quiet, unbloodied scholar of English literature.

Having relied on the major networks and newspapers for a lead, the Facebook activists themselves then served as a source for the mainstream media.  The CNN and BBC started illustrating their stories with the “Angel of Iran” photo; news agencies and newspapers were not far behind.  Of course, blogs and other social networking sites were also off to the races in spreading the mistaken photo.  And it wasn’t long before the photo made its way back into Iran and went viral among the Green Movement.

But before the T-shirts and the posters and the ad hoc candlelit street altars, Neda Soltani awoke on June 21 of last year to discover an inbox full of countless requests to befriend her on Facebook.  Then came the phone calls. A professor burst into tears when he heard her voice.

Neda didn’t begrudge the initial error.  There was some resemblance between her and the slain protester, after all.  Neda thought the mistake was liable to correct itself eventually, but decided to speed the process along by reaching out to Voice of America, the U.S.-backed satellite network that was among the most strident in using her photo to agitate the Iranian public.  In an email, she explained that there had been a mix-up; they had been using a false photo, and she included other photos of herself as evidence.

What followed was a disheartening education in applied media ethics.  Instead of issuing a correction, VOA promoted the very photos Neda had used to absolve herself as “exclusive” images of the slain protester.  The momentum of the story overwhelmed attempted interventions of the truth.  Neda tried repeatedly to sway different networks and news agencies, but for all intents and purposes, she had lost control over her face.  On Internet forums, her requests that her photo be removed were met with the accusation that she was a stooge for the regime.  “You won’t take our angel away from us, you bastard,” one Internet commenter writes in reply to her plea.  On June 23, 2009, the parents of Neda Agha-Soltan released for public use a photo of their daughter—the one who, in fact, had been killed—but it had trouble competing with the existing, if false, image of Neda for primacy as the face of Iran’s freedom movement…”

According to Abadi’s article, Neda Soltani now lives outside Iran, in Germany, where she is struggling to put her life back together.  We are not in a position to vouch for all of the things reported in Abadi’s story.  But, if the article is accurate, it provides further confirmation for several important truths that we have sought to explore on www.TheRaceForIran.com:    

First, while VOA’s behavior, as depicted in the article, is beneath contempt, there is a bigger point here—the Obama Administration, like the George W. Bush Administration before it, has decided to use media and broadcasting into Iran as a foundational pillar for a “soft” regime change strategy.  In this regard, see the following passage from Doyle McManus’ well-reported column published in the Los Angeles Times over the past weekend about the “messier, more improvisational approach” that increasingly characterizes the Obama Administration’s Iran policy:

“One new track is long term:  democracy-building.  After initial hesitation, the administration has quietly increased its indirect support for Iran’s democracy movement—very quietly, because the U.S. wants to avoid tainting the dissidents with charges of foreign sponsorship.  Most of the help has come in the form of increased hours of Persian-language radio and television broadcasting into Iran, and in export permits for U.S.-made software to help Iranians evade their government’s efforts to block or punish Internet use.” 

The British government, of course, is also relying on media and broadcasting as part of a “soft” regime change strategy.  This strategy rests on an assumption that, if the Iranian people could only hear the right “message”, they would hold different views about a wide range of domestic and international issues and choose “better” leaders for themselves. 

Based on our personal experiences in Iran, talking with a wide range of official and unofficial Iranians, reading Iranian websites, and seeing comments posted on www.TheRaceForIran.com by readers in Iran, we do not believe that Iranians are lacking in knowledge about their own country or the outside world.  Many Iranians, however, do seem to come to different conclusions about various issues than those preferred in the White House, Foggy Bottom, and Whitehall.  But the U.S. and British governments should focus on figuring out how to deal constructively with Iranians (and others) who do not accept preferred Western narratives about the Middle East and the international order—not basing policy on the delusional proposition that the activities of VOA and the BBC’s Persian Service will somehow change Iranians’ minds about these issues, much less prompt them to change their country’s whole political order.       

Second, it seems increasingly clear that important mainstream media outlets—including CNN and BBC, as reported by Abadi, but also august newspapers like The New York Times (see our related piece here)—are frequently willing to put aside basic practices of responsible journalism when reporting on Iran.  This willingness is partially captured in Abadi’s references to editors in New York and London “forgoing fact checks” and allowing “small details” (a person’s actual identity is a “small detail”??) to “get lost” in the quest for a sexy story.  But the problem goes beyond professional lapses by individual journalists and editors.  (For what it’s worth, one of the comments to Abadi’s article on ForeignPolicy.com claims that the BBC eventually issued a public acknowledgement of its error regarding Neda Soltani’s identity.) 

We should be asking why those lapses are so frequent—indeed, chronic—in reporting and analysis on Iran.  In some cases, the personal political agendas of individual reporters and editors seem to be a critical factor.  But, more broadly, doing serious, reality-based reporting on Iranian politics (including rigorous sourcing and actual fact-checking) could end up regularly putting mainstream media outlets at odds with the narrative about Iranian politics and foreign policy preferred—and paid for—by the U.S. and British governments.  (See our point above on the use of media in the ongoing U.S.-UK “soft” regime change strategy.)  As Michael Massing and others have chronicled (see here), mainstream media outlets—including The New York Times and the Washington Post—were strategically unwilling to do that in the run up to the 2003 invasion of Iraq.  Unfortunately, they seem equally unwilling to do it today with regard to Iran. 

The “regime change in Iran” campaign is gaining momentum in the United States.  Two Republican senators—John Cornyn of Texas and Sam Brownback of Kansas—have introduced a bill which, if enacted into law, would make regime change the formal and explicit goal of America’s Iran policy and, among other things, authorize the President “to provide assistance for broadcasting and other communications directly to Iranian democratic opposition organizations”, see here.  In connection with the anniversary of Iran’s June 12, 2009 presidential election, Senator (and former Republican presidential candidate) John McCain also made a public call for the United States to make regime change in Tehran the declared goal of its Iran policy, and to marshal America’s allies to make their own contributions toward that goal, see here.

If President Obama is not already aware of the relevant history, he should take note that it was not President George W. Bush who defined regime change in Baghdad as the goal of America’s Iraq policy—it was President Bill Clinton, who, in 1998, signed into law the Iraq Liberation Act.  History may not repeat itself exactly, but—as an aphorism frequently attributed to Mark Twain notes—it does often rhyme.  Washington needs less poetry about contemporary Iranian politics—and more non-rhyming analysis grounded in actual, on-the-ground reality.           

–Flynt Leverett and Hillary Mann Leverett

**For the photo above: David Ignatius (left), the moderator of this panel at last year’s Davos World Economic Forum, tries to stop Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey (center) from speaking. Mr. Erdogan later left the stage to protest comments by President Shimon Peres of Israel (right).**

As the interlinked dramas of Israel’s attack on Turkish civilian ships on the high seas and the Obama Administration’s push for a new Iran sanctions resolution in the Security Council play out, some in the American foreign policy establishment are beginning to realize that the Middle East—and America’s place in it—are changing in profound ways. 

Turkey’s deepening engagement in the region is an extremely important catalyst for change.  Of course, this is not a new or suddenly breaking news story.  Turkey’s refusal to allow U.S. forces to invade Iraq from Turkish territory in 2003—not long after Erdoğan’s AKP had come to power–should have been a wake-up call.  At the time, though, Turkey’s decision was dismissed by the Washington establishment with a mix of disbelief and a refusal to appreciate how popular the decision was in Turkey. 

After Turkey’s key role, along with Brazil, in brokering the recent nuclear deal with Iran and Erdoğan’s strong reaction to the Israeli attack on Turkish-flagged vessels, the U.S. foreign policy establishment is now compelled, by force of events, to recognize that something important is afoot.  In this regard, we were struck by David Ignatius’ most recent column in the Washington Post, “Flotilla raid offers Israel a learning opportunity.”  He writes,

“By attacking the relief flotilla, Israel picked a fight with Turkey, a more dangerous foe than Hamas. The quarrel has been brewing for the past several years, and it’s a huge strategic change in the Middle East. Once Israel’s most important regional ally, Turkey now seeks to challenge Israel’s hegemony as the local superpower. Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan is a Muslim populist with a charismatic message: We won’t let Israel push us around. Where Iran’s president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, is often a buffoon, Erdoğan is a genuinely tough if erratic rival.”

Ignatius underestimates Ahmadinejad and the Islamic Republic’s challenge to Israel.  But, to his credit, puts his finger on the most important strategic implication of Erdoğan’s challenge—it is fundamentally a challenge to Israel’s sense of unfettered hegemony over the region. 

In explaining why Israel decided to attack Turkish ships headed for Gaza, Ignatius writes, with blazing clarity, “The answer is that over many years, Israel has become accustomed to unchallenged freedom of military action in the Middle East.”  That is absolutely correct, and Israel is determined to preserve this freedom of action, whatever the cost—and to persuade craven American politicians and the more gullible parts of the American public that both vital U.S. interests and Israel’s very survival are at stake in preserving it, even when that is manifestly not the case. 

We have previously made a similar argument about what is at stake for Israel in the disposition of the Iranian nuclear issue, see here.  The Islamic Republic’s nuclear program is hardly an “existential threat” to Israel.  But, a nuclear-capable Iran might, at the margins, begin to impose some limits on Israel’s absolute freedom to use military force unilaterally, wherever it wants, and for whatever purpose it favors. 

The Israeli argument against Iran’s nuclear development—like its argument against Turkey’s pique over having Turkish vessels attacked on the high seas, its argument that settlements in occupied territory are completely legal, and its argument that blockading a civilian population in Gaza is also completely legal—is not based on rational analysis of actual physical threats.  All of these arguments are directed towards the preservation of Israel’s regional hegemony, embodied in its unchallenged freedom of military action in the Middle East. 

From this perspective, Iran and Turkey pose very similar “threats” to Israel.  Iran’s re-emergence as a powerful regional player (with its principal regional foes, Iraq and Afghanistan, neutered by U.S. invasions) with the potential for a nuclear weapons “option” could effectively check Israel’s ability to use force unilaterally whenever and wherever it chooses.  And, Turkey’s challenge to the siege of Gaza by Israel (and, let’s be fair, Egypt, too) could, if successful, have a similar effect.

–Flynt Leverett and Hillary Mann Leverett

****This piece also appears today in The Huffington Post.****

The unfolding drama of the Brazil-Turkey nuclear deal and the Obama Administration’s reactive push to move a draft sanctions resolution in the United Nations Security Council will have profound effects on the character of international relations for years to come.  At least two such effects warrant particular attention.   

First, for those in official Washington or anywhere else who still doubt that the “post-American world” is here, the deal to refuel the Tehran Research Reactor (TRR) brokered by Brazil and Turkey should serve as a blaring wake-up call.  As we noted earlier, two rising economic powers from what we used to call the “Third World” have now asserted decisive political influence on a high-profile international security issue.  And, in doing so, they have signaled that Washington can no longer unilaterally define terms for managing such issues.  As a consequence, President Obama’s most serious foreign policy challenge—repairing America’s image as a global leader—just got more daunting.      

Second, by answering Brazil and Turkey’s extraordinary diplomatic effort with an arrogant assertion of the P-5’s power to demand the rapid imposition of new sanctions on Iran and reinstating a demand that Iran must suspend enrichment to avoid new sanctions, the Obama Administration is following a course that could inflict serious damage not only on America’s global standing, but also on the legitimacy of the Security Council itself. 

As we noted previously, getting P-5 agreement on a substantially watered down and incomplete draft resolution is not the same as ensuring the requisite nine affirmative votes for it.  But, even if Washington is able to ram new sanctions through a deeply divided Council, that course carries huge long-term risks. Already, Turkish Prime Minister Erdoğan is questioning the Council’s “credibility” to deal with the Iranian nuclear issue.  If Washington torpedoes the new nuclear deal before it can be tested, expect Turkey, Brazil, and others to intensify this sort of challenge to the Council’s legitimacy—with support not just from Iran but from a broad range of “non-aligned” countries. 

The Obama Administration has only itself to blame for this situation, because it has approached—and is still approaching—the Iranian nuclear issue with unilateral hubris worthy of George W. Bush.  The Administration has continued to insist that Iran cannot indigenously enrich uranium, even as part of a broader nuclear deal.  It took what should have been a straightforward technical discussion on refueling the TRR—a thoroughly safeguarded facility in the middle of Tehran that produces medical isotopes—and turned it into a highly politicized effort to exchange most of Iran’s low-enriched uranium for promises of new fuel at some unspecified point in the future.  Washington then demanded that other countries unquestioningly support these positions.   

When rising powers like Brazil, Turkey, and China were reluctant to go along, the Administration thought it could browbeat them into submission.  Speaking “privately”, Administration officials questioned whether the presumed ambitions of Brazilian President Lula—who leaves office in December—to become the first non-American World Bank president or the next UN secretary general could be realized if he antagonizes Washington over Iran.  Last week, Secretary of State Clinton publicly ridiculed Turkish Foreign Minister Davutoğlu’s efforts to mediate a nuclear compromise.  And U.S. officials told Chinese counterparts that, if Beijing does not support tough new sanctions against Iran, Washington would not be able to restrain Israeli military action, putting China’s energy supplies at risk. 

But these rising powers were not prepared to be browbeaten.  For Brazil—which gave up its own nuclear weapons program but insists on continuing uranium enrichment—the idea that Washington could unilaterally redefine the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) regarding enrichment was especially odious.  For Turkey, under a popular, democratically elected Islamist government, the idea that Iran’s nuclear program would be treated differently because Iran is governed by Islamists was equally unacceptable.  China has longstanding objections to international sanctions, and has consistently advocated diplomacy as the best way to deal with the Iranian nuclear issue.     

The Obama Administration insisted that the proposal to refuel the TRR advanced in October by the IAEA’s former Director General, Mohamed ElBaradei, be treated as a non-negotiable, “take it or leave it” proposition.  Last month, though, Baradei himself said the proposal should not be treated this way.  Since last October, Iran has consistently said that it accepted in principle the idea of a “swap” to refuel the TRR, but wanted to negotiate the specific terms of a deal.  So, as the Administration made itself diplomatically irrelevant, Brazil and Turkey set out on their own to broker a compromise. 

The Brazilian-Turkish deal makes explicit what the October proposal obfuscated:  Iran has the right to enrich uranium on its territory.  Realistically, the chances that Iran would ever surrender its enrichment program are now virtually nil.  But the Obama Administration—like its predecessor—refuses to make the shift from working quixotically to stop the unstoppable to negotiating rigorous verification measures for Iran’s enrichment facilities to ensure they are not producing weapons-grade fissile material.  Now, others have stepped into the breach and redefined the Iranian nuclear issue for the Administration.    

The new nuclear deal also undermines claims of the Obama Administration—which, like its predecessors, maintains no diplomatic presence in Iran and has had extremely limited contact with Iranian officials—to a monopoly on sound judgments about Iranian decision-making and policy.  For months, Administration officials—and most U.S.-based Iran analysts—have asserted that the Islamic Republic is too internally conflicted to have a coherent international strategy or make important decisions.  Senior Brazilian, Chinese, and Turkish officials who have invested significant amounts of time in substantive discussions with Iranian counterparts argued to Washington for months that a nuclear deal was possible.  But Secretary Clinton and others in the Obama Administration thought they knew better—and said so publicly.   

In fact, Iran has worked purposefully—dare we say strategically—to cultivate relations with important rising powers, like Brazil and Turkey, as well as China.  And, this week, Tehran showed that it can take major decisions.  Can the same things be said of the Obama Administration?      

President Obama, who came to office professing a new U.S. approach to international engagement, allowed himself to be upstaged by new powers because he has been unwilling to match his rhetoric with truly innovative diplomacy that takes real notice of other countries’ interests.  If he does not close this gap, America’s global leadership will continue to decline.  And, the institutional architecture for global governance in the 21st century–to which Obama has professed rhetorical support–will be put at risk.

–Flynt Leverett and Hillary Mann Leverett

Flynt Leverett and Hillary Mann Leverett appeared on The Charlie Rose Show last night.

The video can be viewed here.

– Ben Katcher

Most of the Western media failed to report on Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s annual, live Nowruz (Persian New Year) address yesterday in his hometown of Mashhad.  Instead they took conventional snippets from his earlier pre-recorded message for state television.  In doing so, the Western media have again missed important content and context regarding Khamenei’s approach to dealing with the United States and Iran’s geopolitics.

The critical point in Khamenei’s live address this year was his reiteration of last year’s ground-breaking offer:

“We [the Islamic Republic] have no history with the new [U.S.] administration and president.  We reserve our judgment. If you change, our conduct will change as well.” 

But, this year, Khamenei questioned Obama’s determination to change the core substance of America’s approach to the Islamic Republic and emphasized that Iran would not be swept up in Obama’s emotional but, from Khamenei’s perspective, substantively empty rhetoric of “change”.  Khamenei said:

“I don’t know who the decision makers in the U.S. are –the President, Congress, others behind the scenes—but what I do know is that Iran has acted on the basis of logic…we do not act emotionally with regard to the issues important to us.  We make decisions on the basis of calculations, rather than emotions.”

To be well understood, Khamenei’s live Nowruz address this year needs to be read in conjunction with his live Nowruz speech in Mashhad last year.  Last year’s address came on the heels of President Obama’s attention-getting 2009 Nowruz video message, which had been released just a couple of days before.  In that video message, Obama had directed his remarks to “the people and leaders of the Islamic Republic of Iran” (actually referring to the country by its official name) and proclaimed that:

“my administration is now committed to diplomacy that addresses the full range of issues before us, and to pursuing constructive ties among the United States, Iran, and the international community.”  Even more importantly, Obama noted that “this process will not be advanced by threats.  We seek instead engagement that is honest and grounded in mutual respect.” 

Multiple Iranian sources, official and otherwise, have told us that Obama’s words were positively received in Tehran.  In fact, Obama’s message directly prompted Khamenei’s offer two days later in his 2009 Mashhad speech: “You change, and we shall change as well.”  On the day that Khamenei made this statement, we were attending a Middle East security conference in the region, at which one of the other participants was a former Iranian diplomat with considerable high-level experience in the Islamic Republic’s policymaking circles, who had effectively stepped out of public life following President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s initial election in 2005.  When Flynt read, from his Blackberry, an English translation of Khamenei’s pledge that if “you change, we will change as well”, our Iranian colleague’s eyes grew wide and he exclaimed, “This is already very positive!”  

As we have written previously, during our recent trip to Tehran, our Iranian interlocutors underscored the significance of Khamenei’s declaration that if “you change, we will change as well”.  In particular, our interlocutors emphasized that this statement represented a calculated and rapid response to Obama’s 2009 Nowruz message from the Islamic Republic’s highest level of authority.  Some of our interlocutors pointed out that Khamenei’s formulation—which left it up to Obama to determine what “change” in American behavior or policy he was prepared to pursue—was deliberately crafted to maximize Obama’s room to maneuver. 

Against this backdrop, Khamenei’s speech in Mashhad yesterday clearly reveals the depth of Iranian disappointment with the course of U.S. policy since last March.  More specifically, the speech conveyed considerable anger about perceived American support for the domestic opposition that emerged following the Islamic Republic’s June 12, 2009 presidential election, continued U.S. involvement with violent separatist movements that continue to carry out terrorist attacks inside Iran, Obama’s failure to break with a 30-year history of American efforts to isolate, press, and undermine the Islamic Republic, and what Khamenei sees as American deceit. 

Referring to Obama’s rhetoric about the Islamic Republic, Khamenei noted in his address yesterday that

“the United States says ‘Let’s forget the past, we want to negotiate with Iran…we are extending our hand.’  What kind of hand?  If it is an iron hand concealed in a velvet glove, that has no positive meaning for Iran.  [The United States] sends greetings for a holiday but at the same time accuses Iranians of supporting terrorism and nuclear weapons, which is against the Koran…They are saying, ‘Let’s negotiate…build relations.’  They use the slogan of ‘change.’  Well, where is this change?  What has changed?  Make it clear to us—what has changed?” 

Then, in contrast to his approach in last year’s live Mashhad speech, Khamenei yesterday spelled out the kinds of changes that Iran needs to see in U.S. policy in order to believe that Obama is serious about wanting to put U.S.-Iranian relations on a more positive trajectory:

“Has your hostility to the Iranian people changed?  Where is the sign of that?  Have you released the Iranian assets?  Have you lifted the unjust sanctions?  Have you stopped the mud-slinging, the accusations and the propaganda against this great nation and its leaders who rose from among the people?  Have you stopped your unconditional defense of the Zionist regime?  What has changed?  They use the slogan of change, but in fact there is no evidence of change…Change in words is not enough, not that we have even seen such a significant change in words so far.  There should be real change.  You say, ‘We want to change our policy.  But we will change our tactics, not our goals.’  This is not real change.  It is deceit.  Real change should be evident in actions.” 

Clearly referencing Obama’s statement last year that diplomacy between the United States and Iran “will not be advanced by threats,” Khamenei said yesterday in Mashhad:

“As long as the U.S. government continues its conduct, its actions and its policies against us, as it has done for the past 30 years, we will be the same people we have been in these 30 years.  You say ‘We will negotiate with Iran and exert pressure on it.’  This is a threat combined with enticement.  Our people resents such talk.  It is unacceptable to talk to our people like this.” 

In closing, Khamenei seemed to say that, if America does not change the substance of its policies towards the Islamic Republic, Iran will go its own way:  “If you do not change, our people has become, over the past 30 years, more resilient, stronger and more experienced”.  In this context, it is important to read Khamenei’s lines in Mashhad yesterday about America’s deteriorating strategic position: 

“The situation in which the U.S. government has found itself is detrimental to both the American people and its government.  Today, you are hated throughout the world… The reason is that you treat the world as if you were its guardians.  You talk with arrogance and you want to impose your will on the world.  You interfere in the affairs of other countries.  You employ double standards in the world… Stop your arrogant tone of speech and your condescending conduct.  Stop your patronizing behavior.  Don’t interfere in the affairs of other countries.” 

These words reflect a growing perception among Iranian political and policymaking elites that the United States is a power in steep and accelerating decline.  They are also almost certainly calculated to appeal to elites in rising, non-Western powers—China, Russia, Brazil, India, and in the Arab world—as well as Turkey, which have their own concerns about American arrogance and unilateralism, and assert strict definitions of sovereignty and non-interference in sovereign states’ internal affairs as a defense against perceived U.S. double standards and inclination to meddle in the affairs of other countries. 

In this context, Obama’s Nowruz message for this year, which came in a video released by the White House on March 20, seems willfully oblivious to what it would actually take for the United States to achieve a genuine realignment of U.S.-Iranian relations.  Obama glosses over his failure to capitalize on the prospective opening created by his forward-leaning rhetoric about Iran that characterized the early months of his presidency with one of the oldest rhetorical tricks in the book—blame the other guy.  Noting that “Iran’s leaders have sought their own legitimacy through hostility to America”, Obama challenges those leaders—“we know what you’re against; now tell us what you’re for”.  He then places the onus for the failure of U.S. engagement with Iran squarely on the shoulders of the Islamic Republic’s leaders: 

“For reasons known only to them, the leaders of Iran have shown themselves unable to answer that question.  You have refused good faith proposals from the international community.  They have turned their backs on a pathway that would bring more opportunity to all Iranians, and allow a great civilization to take its rightful place in the community of nations.  Faced with an extended hand, Iran’s leaders have shown only a clenched fist.” 

Taking a page from President George W. Bush’s playbook, Obama continues by praising domestic political opposition in the Islamic Republic: 

“Last June, the world watched with admiration as Iranians sought to exercise their universal right to be heard.  But tragically, the aspirations of the Iranian people were also met with a clenched fist, as people marching silently were beaten with batons, political prisoners were rounded up and abused, and false accusations were leveled against the United States and the West, and people everywhere were horrified by the video of a young woman killed in the street.” 

Obama concludes with a judgment that “over the course of the last year, it is the Iranian government that has chosen to isolate itself, and to choose a self-defeating focus on the past over a commitment to build a better future.”  In this rhetorical context, how can President Obama expect Tehran to take seriously his statement that “our offer of comprehensive diplomatic contacts and dialogue stands”?  What is the substantive agenda for such a dialogue—something that the Islamic Republic has explicitly expressed an interest in defining?  How has President Obama modified the U.S. posture toward Iran to show that he is truly serious about strategic rapprochement?  (Khamenei’s remarks and our conversations with Iranian officials would suggest that Tehran has not observed any such modifications.) 

In an asymmetric relationship such as that between the United States and the Islamic Republic, for the United States to insist that Tehran must show that it is “serious” about improved relations before Washington takes concrete steps of its own is a recipe for guaranteed diplomatic failure.  If U.S. rapprochement with Iran is now a strategic imperative for America and its allies—as we very strongly believe it is—then Washington needs to be focused on what it will take to achieve rapprochement, not on artificial and self-defeating “tests” of Iranian seriousness.  If Richard Nixon had taken the same approach to the People’s Republic of China as Obama is taking to the Islamic Republic of Iran, the United States might still not have an embassy in Beijing.    

–Flynt Leverett and Hillary Mann Leverett