Russia Does What It Has To with Iran
// The price of the question
The visit of Saeed Jalili, secretary of the Islamic Republic of Iran's Supreme National Security Council, to Moscow is unlikely to change anything with the nuclear program there. Iran will move at full speed toward acquisition of a full nuclear cycle and then to nuclear weapons. The world community will make it very clear that that is impermissible and place its hopes on stronger UN sanctions. Russia, which needs a nuclear bomb in Teheran's arsenal as much as it needs a war on its southern borders, will try to defuse the crisis without fighting with Iran or the United States. Washington will continue preparations for military operations, intimidating Iran and opening the way for a “constructive dialog” on Iraq and driving a wedge between Iran and Syria, trying to avoid direct hostilities with Syria but provoking a conflict between Iran and Israel, so it can save Israel and, in the end, pay for its mistakes with its own interests. Beijing will maintain its long-term policy of support for Iran in principle, but will do what is necessary at the necessary moment to betray it by agreeing to sanctions “under pressure of circumstances.” The Arab world will harshly condemn possible aggression against the fraternal Islamic Republic, while hoping it occurs any way, without touching the export interests of the Gulf monarchies. They will also gradually increase their own nuclear capabilities. Finally, Jerusalem, the main target of the Iranian missiles, will bounce back and forth between bravado at home and SOS internationally.
If Iran creates a full nuclear cycle, it can create nuclear weapons. That will make the Islamic Revolution invulnerable to outside hits. The unity of the nation will be strengthened around its religious leader and president. That will allow them to take control of elite Iranian groups and alliances that now claim independence. It will give them the chance to put their own people in all key positions, which is especially important in today's “oil rain.” It will end, at least temporarily, with disorder and quavering in the minds of youth, intellectuals and residents of the capital and of national districts. A nuclear Iran will take on the status not only of the leader of the Shia world, but of all the Islamic world. It will have a murderous argument in the literal sense of the word that it can use against Israel. So what are the chances of stopping Iran in its tracks, or even just short of its goal?
They are miniscule. The appearance of Jalili, an Iranian “neocon,” as chief nuclear negotiator, in place of the pragmatic Ali Larijani, is like Leonid Brezhnev being replaced by Mikhail Suslov at talks on detente. In today's Iran, ideological purity is more important than any other arguments. In the USSR, unlike Iran, faith was not present as an argument in the eyes of the leadership, not even in the years of the revolution. The difference may be small, but it is very serious. The Iranian leadership is not afraid of sanctions, conflict with the U.S. or war with Israel – it believes in its victory. That faith is unshakable. All you can say in the face of it is “Do what you have to and what will be will be.” And that is what Russia is doing, trying to turn Iran from a path that, even if it manages to avoid war next year, will most likely lead to an even bigger war within the decade, one more destructive and possibly nuclear.
Evgeny Satanovsky, president of the Institute of the Middle East
All the Article in Russian as of Dec. 04, 2007
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