Andreas G. Banoutsos
(RIEAS Junior Analyst)
Copyright: www.rieas.gr
Iran has expanded its capacity to enrich uranium and now has 3,000 centrifuges operating enough potentially to produce an atom bomb within a year, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) reported on 15th November 2007. This report contradicts the National Intelligence Estimate (NIE), the inter-departmental report of the American Intelligence services, which was published in December 2007. (1) However the basic conclusion is that the US, the EU, the international community and Israel still face a challenge: how to prevent a nuclear Iran. And of course the fundamental question is why the international community has to stop Iran from going nuclear.
In my opinion the Iranian regime is basically a messianic apocalyptic cult. According to Dr.Daniel Pipes (2) Director of the US based think tank Middle East Forum:‘’Thanks to the president of Iran, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, a new word has entered the political vocabulary: mahdaviat. Mahdaviat means ‘belief in and efforts to prepare for the Mahdi.’ He is, explains the Encyclopaedia of Islam, ‘the restorer of religion and justice who will rule before the end of the world.’ ‘Belief in the coming of the Mahdi of the Family of the Prophet became a central aspect of the faith in radical Shi‘ism,’ where it is also known as the return of the Twelfth Imam.
The most dangerous leaders in modern history are those (such as Hitler) equipped with a totalitarian ideology and a mystical belief in their own mission. Mahmoud Ahmadinejad fulfils both these criteria. That combined with his expected nuclear arsenal make him an adversary who must be stopped, and urgently.’’
In other words the key to understand Iran’s nuclear ambitions lies in the mystical belief and efforts to prepare for the Mahdi, the restorer of religion and justice who will rule before the end of the world. The Iranian President’s efforts to prepare for the Mahdi include that Israel should be ‘’wiped off the map’’. And of course it would be much easier for Iran to wipe Israel off the map, if it will acquire nuclear weapons. Israel naturally will answer by bombing Iran with nuclear nukes and this will mean for every reasonable person if not Armageddon, surely the end of international security and a huge disaster for world economy.
According to Michael Eisenstadt “If Iran goes nuclear there will be a number of political consequences. First it will further demoralize those seeking political change, and strengthen the regime hard-liners-at least in the short term. Some, like Saudi Arabia and various oil-rich Gulf states, might seek an independent WMD capability.”(3)
The Iranian regime has and can be stopped. It is a lot weaker than it appears. According to Israel’s former PM and current Leader of the Likud Party Benjamin Netanyahu (4) Iran’s oil production has declined by 10% every year for the last three years. Their oil industry desperately needs new investment. Investments are coming primarily from Western countries like France, Germany and Britain, which are keeping Iran’s economy afloat. Encouraging divestment from Iran by US state pension funds is a feasible solution. If these pension funds divest their holdings from companies that do business with Iran, those companies’ credit ratings will decline. Their cost of credit goes up immediately, plus they lose a component of their equity, and this is very powerful.
Of course if a variety of economic sanctions will not work, another option should be a UN lead pre-emptive attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities. Unfortunately this solution is not likely to be very realistic because of Russia’s and China’s opposition in a resolution of this kind in the UN Security Council. A strike against Iran from the USA should also be excluded, since the USA cannot act on military terms alone, because it is still deeply involved in Iraq as Ioannis Michaletos correctly mentioned in a RIEAS previous editorial.
According to Michael Eisenstadt “preventive military action is not the attractive option it might be thought to be, because the USA may not have sufficiently detailed intelligence required for success, due to the immense secrecy surrounding the program and its strategic dispersal across the country.” (5) The best policy option according to Jafarzadeh, President of Strategy Policy Consulting Inc and a foreign affairs analyst for FOX News Channel, is for the U.S to support the opposition group Mujahedin-e-Khalq(MEK) instead of it being on the terrorist list of the State Department. The group is heavily armed and is strong enough to confront Iranian troops. Bombing Iran, Jafarzadeh claimed, will not help and, at best, would delay Iran’s nuclear program.(6)
Another policy option for stopping Iran from going nuclear is not a preventive conventional military action from the U.S but a nuclear pre-emptive strike carried out from NATO forces. This policy option might be the only one to be proved effective enough to stop Ahmadinejad’s nuclear ambitions. However, this policy option will have a great cost in lives for innocent ordinary Iranian citizens and for humanitarian reasons should be avoided.
Furthermore a policy option I would recommend is the implementation of the successful Israeli policy of targeted killings in the case of Iran. Asaf Romirowsky a Campus Watch Associate Fellow for the Middle East Forum has argued that targeted killing of terrorist leaders is by definition effective. Well-planned targeted killing by Israeli security forces can certainly be a powerful tool for Israeli counter-terror.(7)
This policy had great success in the case of Hamas’ spiritual leader Sheikh Ahmed Yasin in 2004. Perhaps it is time to be implemented for Iran’s radical leader Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. If only we could imagine how the world would be if this effective policy had been implemented before World War II for Adolf Hitler.
Notes:
1) www.timesonline.co.uk ( 16th November 2007)
2) www.danielpipes.org/article/3258
3) www.meforum.org/article/699
4) www.jcpa.org ( July 2007)
5) www.meforum.org/article/699
6) www.meforum.org/article/1757
7) www.meforum.org/article/980