“The people of Iraq can shake off their captivity. They can one day join a democratic Afghanistan and a democratic Palestine, inspiring reform throughout the Middle East.”¹ – George W. Bush

“There was no dilemma when it came to shooting people who were not in uniform, I just pulled the trigger… If they were there, they were the enemy.”² – Specialist (Corporal) Michael Richardson, 3/15^th US Infantry Division 

“What can America do for us? They are only looking out for their own interests”³ – Iranian Student

Analysts and theoreticians of international relations always saw wars as harbingers of change and transformation to regional and international politics. Certainly America’s wars in Afghanistan and Iraq brought about major changes to the regional balance of power, alliance patterns, and in the overall relationship between the West and the Islamic world. Change in the Middle East was not only manifested by the ever-increasing presence of US troops as occupation forces in both Afghanistan and Iraq, but also in terms of peace initiatives and economic conferences aimed at legitimizing the newly redrawn regional landscape – a landscape designed according to a new strategic configuration set by Washington and Tel Aviv.  

In that respect, one could view the Sharm El Sheikh and Aqaba Summits and the agenda of the World Economic Forum (WEF) as a series of interrelated events, aiming to consolidate US and Israeli political and economic dominance during a gross imbalance of power in their favor. 

From the 1979 Camp David Accords to the Prince Abdullah Peace Initiative in 2002, all official Arab peace efforts have revolved around the “land for peace” formula and the acceptance of normalization in return for Israeli withdrawal. From its newly acquired strategic high ground, Washington seeks to force the Arab world to accept unconditional political and economic normalization with Israel, using the same initiatives that were deemed unacceptable when tabled in the early 1990s.⁴ 

Another interesting yet interrelated phenomena is US policy towards Syria and Iran – two states in opposition to Washington’s designs for the region. There seems to be an increasing tendency on the part of Washington to isolate those two countries and re-establish the “dual containment” policy once in place against Iraq and Iran. However, this time, Syria would replace Iraq as the other pillar against whom the policy is directed.

Both Syria and Iran have been excluded from all regional initiatives, and a series of allegations, threats and criticisms have been hurled at them from Washington in recent months. Just as Syria was accused of sponsoring “terrorism” and building weapons of mass destruction, recent increasingly hostile US rhetoric towards Iran centered around the latter’s alleged nuclear weapons program, its meddling in Iraqi affairs and its opposition to the so-called Arab-Israeli peace process. Just as it did at the beginning of the Iraqi crisis, the US demanded that the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) force Iran to open up its nuclear program for strict inspection and declare Iran in violation of the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, which would allow the issue to be raised before the UN Security Council for possible action.⁵

Many US officials have contemplated the idea of “regime change” in Iran, and sought to capitalize on the student demonstrations taking place there. Ironically, while President Bush remained silent while thousands of anti-war or pro-Intifadah protestors were mercilessly persecuted in pro-Western Arab capitals over the past months, he declared that his country “stands squarely” beside the Iranian students, warning the Iranian leadership “to treat them with the utmost of respect.”⁶ 

The degree of polarization between Iran and the United States since 1979 is demonstrated by the fact that Iran is the only country in the world that refuses to have formal contact with US officials.⁷ Even officials from North Korea and Cuba meet with US representatives, as did Soviet Union officials during the height of the Cold War. From a historical perspective, American attempts to influence events in Tehran are no different from the past policies of great powers that viewed Iran as a strategic asset and a valuable prize for their imperial ambitions. In turn, Iran’s current self-assertiveness stems from its threat perceptions involving an increasingly belligerent, nuclear-armed Israel and the heavy-handed presence of the US in its proximity. As one of Iran’s leading Ayatollahs, Hashemi Rafsanjani, commented bitterly on Iran’s sense of abandonment almost 15 years ago: “War taught us that international laws are only scraps of paper.”⁸ Once again, Iran finds itself in the eye of the storm. 

Iran’s Turbulent History 

Setting aside the internal dilemmas that plague many Middle Eastern countries when they embark upon a path of transformation, a constant trend has been that every Islamically-oriented or nationalist political experiment in the Middle East had to be hijacked by foreign powers who did not want to see an independent state-building experiment flourish or evolve.⁹ The combined British, French and Austrian attack on the Egyptian fleet at Navarino in 1828, the 1953 CIA coup to bring down the Iranian nationalist Mohammad Mossadegh and reinstall the Shah in Iran, US (and at times, Soviet) attempts to undermine the Abdel Nasser regime in Egypt, and the now 23-year-old sanctions regime imposed on Tehran are all cases in point. This is contrasted to a much different international environment when Western countries were incrementally building their own democracies and political systems without great power intervention. 

Even before the Islamic revolution, the most dominant foreign policy objective of Iran (formerly known as Persia) for the past few centuries had been to avoid colonial control and foreign intervention. During the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, France, Britain and Russia competed for imperial, economic and territorial gains at the court of the Shah. In 1907, Britain and Russia divided Persia into “spheres of influence” where the Russians were given a virtually free hand in Northern Persia and Britain was allotted a small zone in the southeast of the country to bolster its presence near India. 

After World War II, the Soviets sought to incorporate Iran into the USSR and only agreed to withdraw their troops after UN intervention and skillful Iranian diplomatic maneuvering. 

During the Shah’s long reign, Iran was to become the regional policeman and America’s trusted ally in the Middle East. As the Shah’s policies grew more repressive, Richard Nixon pledged that the United States would sell any non-nuclear weapons systems the Shah wished to buy, a privilege extended to no other state – not even America’s NATO allies or Israel.¹⁰ 

Just as the Reformation was critical to the Age of Enlightenment and the birth of modern Western democracy, the Iranian revolution was the modern era’s last great revolution and was critical to the development of the idea of Islamic political empowerment.¹¹ Since its inception in 1979, Iran’s Islamic revolution has been working against a backdrop of greats odds, any one of which would have brought down a weaker regime. To get back at Iran for the humiliation of the hostage crisis, in the waning days of the Carter Administration, Iraq was urged to attack Iran under the pretext of “regaining” the Shatt al-Arab waterway that divided Iraq from Iran, thereby improving Iraqi access to the Persian Gulf. Iraq. Egypt and the Gulf states, fearing Iran’s revolutionary ethos and its attempts to export its revolution, contributed to the war effort. Consequently, the United States saw its national interests served by ensuring that the war was prolonged without either side achieving a decisive victory. However, the US wanted to guarantee that Iraq did not lose to the bigger, more powerful, Iran and hence it provided Iraq with satellite intelligence photos and financed the war through government guaranteed agricultural credits for food imports, which were ultimately diverted to arms acquisition.¹² The United States also turned a blind eye to the Iraqi use of chemical weapons against Kurds and Iranians. 

Despite a more accommodationalist stance by Iran towards international affairs after the death of Khomeini, the US continued to frustrate Iran’s attempts at independent development by insisting on labeling Iran as a “terrorist-sponsoring” state, continuing sanctions on the regime, and containing Iran’s conventional and non-conventional military efforts.   

America’s Motives – Benevolent Democratization or Machiavellian Realism?

Renewed American bellicosity towards Iran is very much related to the fact that the strategic equation in the region has been radically transformed, with US troops virtually surrounding Iran. US policymakers might be urged to capitalize on the momentum created by the presence of their forces in Iraq and Afghanistan – both on Iran’s borders – to force the Iranian regime into concessions or initiate a process of regime change. This could be achieved either by encouraging domestic uprisings in Iran or by isolating the Iranian regime regionally and internationally through the manipulation of nearby governments and/or international organizations and agencies, or through the direct use of military force. 

In addition, American pressure on Iran is part and parcel of Israel’s agenda for the region, following the obliteration of the threat emanating from Saddam’s Iraq – Israel’s longstanding enemy. For a long time, Israeli decision-makers depicted Iran as a nuclear threat and a prime supporter of Islamic “fundamentalist” movements in Palestine and Lebanon. The fact that Iran had not succumbed to American dictates for more than twenty years meant in Israeli thinking that other Islamic movements would follow Iran’s example and seek to resist US and Israeli ambitions. For instance, Rabin’s strategy was to manipulate international media to highlight the dangers of Iran and push the US and other Western powers into confronting it.¹³

Recently, influential interest groups and neoconservatives coalesced behind the scenes in Washington to steer US foreign policy towards Iran in a more belligerent direction. In a conference in early May, Michael Leeden of the American Enterprise Institute said that outside actors are needed to “spark change among an Iranian population fed up with clerical rule.” He was joined by Morris Amitay, a former director of the American Israeli Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), and James Woolsey, a former CIA chief, to create the Coalition for Democracy in Iran.¹⁴ In the US Congress, Senator Sam Brownback introduced an amendment, called the Iran Democracy Act and supported by AIPAC, asking for $50 million to fund opposition groups dedicated to the overthrow of the Islamic regime in Tehran.

Another equally important reason behind recent anti-Iranian moves is related to the political-military conundrum that the US currently finds itself in, in neighboring Iraq. US troops expected to return home after their swift and lightning victory over an already battered Iraqi army. However, more than two months after their “victory,” many of the approximately 140,000 US troops now in Iraq find themselves “peering through a 110-degree haze,” facing a growing insurgency from a hostile local population separated by language and cultural barriers from the occupying forces. Although US troops have reportedly killed more than 100 fighters and arrested dozens of Iraqis in raids on suspected training camps and villages, the US has suffered an average of one soldier killed in combat every other day since President Bush declared on May 1st an end to hostilities in Iraq. Deputy Secretary Paul Wolfowitz, told legislators on Capitol Hill that the US now faces what he termed a “guerilla war” in Iraq.¹⁵

Amidst such anxiety, the US fears that the increasing boldness of the Islamic government in Iran against US threats might embolden Iraqi Shi’ites to resist the Anglo-American occupation and seek the establishment of an Islamic regime modeled on the Iranian system. 

Although the most senior Shi’ite religious leader in Iraq, Ali Sistani, and Ayatollah Mohamed Baqir al-Hakim have refused to officially declare a jihad against US troops, some influential clerics, such as Muqtada al-Sadr of Najaf and Mohamed al-Fartusi in Baghdad, issued bold statements calling for an Islamic government in Iraq. They have also moved to extend their influence in some Shi’ite cities in the south and some slum areas of Baghdad where anti-American sentiment runs high. In addition, the Shi’ites continue to harbor bitter memories from the US decision to abandon them during their 1991 uprising against Saddam’s regime, evoking memories of the historical betrayal surrounding the martyrdom of Imam Hussein in Karbala in 680 AD. Hence, the memories of the past, fused with nationalist and religious sentiments, make the Iraqi Shi’ites very suspicious of the invading foreign, Christian forces. 

Although the Iraqi Shi’ites yearned for the demise of the Baath regime in Baghdad, they collectively despise the idea of a lengthy US occupation or an Iraqi government installed by the United States to further America’s interests and hand over the oil resources of their country to a foreign invader.¹⁶ Given the US-inflicted devastation of Iraq during the war, the daily US killings and arrests of innocent Iraqis, the ongoing lawlessness and continuing lack of basic services, the gap between Iraqi Shi’ites and the US administration seems to be widening. 

As anarchy continues to reign in Iraq and Washington remains unable (or unwilling) to match rhetoric with action, Iraqi Shi’ites might become increasingly receptive to the message of the Ayatollahs emanating from Tehran. One only has to recall the statement made by the Iranian Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamene’i, who declared that his country would not adopt a neutral stance if Iraqis chose to fight against the occupiers.

Conclusions

With the US embroiled in heavy guerilla fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan, its only logical plan of action for the time being would be to intensify political, diplomatic, and economic pressure on Iran. Military action against Iran is fraught with many perils: Iran’s military is much stronger than that of Iraq, its population is three times the size of Iraq’s, its landmass is four times the size, and its terrain is difficult and would make operations a “logistical nightmare.”¹⁷ In addition, any US attempts to more directly intervene in Iranian politics, would revive memories of US meddling in Iranian affairs and automatically strengthen the conservative factions within Iran’s leadership. Also, the Iranians generally tend to rally around their regime when faced with any explicit foreign threats.

Given the flagrant double standards that continue to be applied in the Middle East, one has to ask the following logical questions: Why should Israel’s identity as a “Jewish state” be affirmed and reaffirmed by every American official who visits the region, whereas the Islamic character of Iran’s government is repudiated and vilified on every occasion? Why should Israel’s nuclear warheads not stir up worldwide anxiety, whereas Iran’s nuclear ambitions are a cause of great concern among Western capitals? Indeed, as Samuel Huntington noted: “a world of clashing civilizations, however, is inevitably a world of double standards.”¹⁸

Kareem M. Kamel is an Egyptian freelance writer based in Cairo, Egypt. He has an MA in International Relations and is specialized in security studies, decision-making, nuclear politics, Middle East politics and the politics of Islam. He is currently assistant to the Political Science Department at the American University in Cairo.   

[1] Rachel Bronson, “Restructuring the Middle East?” Brown Journal of World Affairs 10 (Summer/Fall 2003) 

[2] Bob Graham, “I Just Pulled the Trigger,” Jihad Unspun  June 21^st, 2003

[3] Richard Wolffe and Babak Dehghanpisheh, “Firefight Over Iran,” Newsweek June 30^th, 2003 

[4] “Economic Forum Eyes Mideast Peace, Iraq Development,” Islamonline.net  June 21^st, 2003 

[5] Ali Akbar Dareini, “Iran: We’ll Work With UN Nuclear Agency,” Associated Press June 21^st, 2003

[6] Richard Wolffe and Babak Dehghanpisheh, “Firefight Over Iran,” Newsweek June 30^th, 2003 

[7] Geoffrey Kemp, “Iran : Can the United States Do a Deal?” The Washington Quarterly Winter 2001

[8] Peter Jones, “Iran’s Threat Perceptions and Arms Control Policies,” The Nonproliferation Review 6 (Fall1998): 41.

[9] Ian S. Lustick, “The Absence of Middle Eastern Great Powers: Political Backwardness in Historical Perspective,” International Organization 51 (1997)

[10] Marvin Zonis and Amir Mokri, “The Islamic Republic of Iran,” in Tareq Y. Ismael and Jacqueline Ismael, Politics and Government in the Middle East and North Africa (Florida: University of Florida Press, 1991): 119.

[11] Robin Wright, “The Last Great Revolution,” The Journal of the International Institute 

[12] “US-Iraqi Relations in Brief,”  

[13] Israel Shahak, Open Secrets: Israeli Nuclear and Foreign Policies (London: Pluto Press, 1997) : 91

[14] Cameron Kamran, “Iranians Don’t Need American Kingmakers,” International Herald Tribune June 6^th, 2003

[15] Tony Karon, “America’s New War in Iraq,” Time.com  June 19^th, 2003

[16] Yitzhak Nakash, “The Shi’ites and the Future of Iraq,” Foreign Affairs (July/August 2003) 

[17] Kenneth M. Pollack, “Securing the Gulf,” Foreign Affairs July/August 2003 

[18]  Samuel Huntington, “The Clash of Civilizations?: The Next Pattern of Conflict,” Foreign Affairs   Summer 1993: 22-50.

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