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May 14, 2006
The pro-war discourse around the Iranian crisis and potential nuclear threat goes beyond the standard clash of civilisations, which says "Islam is Evil", "they hate us and our values" and that Islam promotes violence. It is constructed in terms of the following frames:
(1) that Iran is a dangerous theocratic state, with an irrational and unstable political and clerical leadership that has supported terrorists and threatened Israel and is therefore not to be trusted with a nuclear program; (2) that it has been secretive about its nuclear program, has not been fully cooperative with the inspections program of the IAEA, and that the reason for this secrecy is Iran's intention to develop nuclear weapons; (3) that its acquisition of a nuclear weapons capability would be intolerable, would destabilize the Middle East if not the whole of Western Civilization, and must be stopped.
The neocon version of the pro-war discourse that is offered to, and hardly contested in the corporate media, suggests that there is a threat of "appeasement" of Iran, and that if the world is "to avoid another Munich," and the "Security Council fails to confront the Iranian threat," then it is up to the United States to "form an international coalition to disarm the regime" and ensure "regime change."
There is a sense of deja vu in the U.S. government's rhetoric concerning Iranian nuclear enrichment. It is a repetition of the rhetoric employed before the Iraq war. If you remember there was the exaggeration of Iraq's military might, which was seen as a "threat" to its neighbors -- most notably Israel -- and U.S. regional interests. Then came the sanctions that were meant to "contain" the Iraqi regime and impede Hussein's alleged incessant drive for chemical, biological and nuclear weapons.Then there was the muscle flexing and awesome military deployment. Finally came the showdown: war, forced regime change and occupation.
The realist account is that the real objection to Iran's becoming a nuclear power is that Iran would impede the larger US ambitions in the Middle East - the Bush administration's "project of transforming the Middle East". to ensure US hegemony in the region. Iran directly thwarts this project of regional transformation", as Iran demands recognition of its central status in the power hierarchy of the Persian Gulf region. The geopolitical strategy of the US is to reorder the power hierarchy in the Middle East further in favor of the United States. So the US missions in Iraq and Afghanistan are necessary to contain the threat "emanating from Iran". It is unlikely that US forces will leave the region in the near future. The grand strategy to overthrow the Islamic Republic of Iran.
The Bush administration's standard operating procedure for dealing with "axis of evil" members has remained remarkably consistent: - no direct diplomatic contact; attempts to corral and coerce other countries into supporting its efforts to isolate and unseat unfriendly regimes; Washington druming up support for concerted action outside the UN context. So the concerted action against Iran will involve sanctions "outside the UN" by a so-called "coalition of the willing". The sanctions would be contrary to international law, and would include freezing the foreign assets of Iranian officials, closing export credit lines, closing Iranian government bank accounts, and freezing Iranian government assets.
Such economic sanctions against Tehran would inevitably lead to a reduction in Iran's oil exports, and could easily drive international oil prices above US$100 per barrel.
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I would suggest to you that point 1 is reasonable. Iran is a regime where religious nutters have an unhealthy sway. I don't think it is just the United States or Israel that has reasons to be alarmed. People complain, and rightly so, that religious fundamentalists have too much sway in the United States; such complaints should go double for Iran and its very dubious 'democracy'.
Point 2 is reasonable but irrelevant. All states are secretive on nuclear matters.
I don't think there's any doubts that Iran's program is at least with half and probably 4/5ths of an eye with weapons in mind. I am agnostic about the virtues of nuclear reactors, and can't claim to be an engineer, but isn't Iran rather geologically unstable to be building nuclear power plants on? I seem to recall only a couple of years ago that they had a very nasty earthquake that killed 20,000 people or something.
Not ideal for building reactors, I would have thought.
Point 3 seems irrelevant. I think if they get nukes and don't use them in the first couple of years, the area will get used to it.
What isn't been discussed in the corporate media OR on blogs is how well Russia is doing out of this situation. Vladimir Putin is my sort of guy and he's playing both the Americans and the Iranians for absolute suckers. Whatever happens in the crisis, Russia is a big winner.
See, if there's a war, the price of energy is going to skyrocket again, so Russia wins big, and if there isn't a war, there will still be plenty of tension to keep energy prices high (although supply and demand will do that enough anyway), AND Iran's regime will remain a willing customer for Russia's nuclear technology and weapon systems.
There was an excellent story in the New York Times a couple of weeks ago about how Putin is sticking his claws into every valuable corporate pie in Russia- sadly it is hidden by the pay per view wall now. But mark my words; Russia is back in the Great Game of Middle Eastern politics, and things are going to get a lot more interesting.