Iran-watchers had their work cut out last week making sense of attacks on Israeli diplomats in Asia, confusion over a ban on oil sales to EU countries, a vaunted advance in the country’s nuclear program and a cleverly formulated offer of a new round of talks on that contentious issue.
It made for a slew of mixed messages that underlined just how hard it is to understand the opaque reality of one of the most important countries in the Middle East and, some observers warn, to overcome politically loaded Western preconceptions about its behavior.
Tehran flatly denied any part in the incidents in Thailand and India. However, despite the Keystone Cops storyline of inept bombers and bungled plans, the attacks did look like retaliation for alleged Israeli killings of Iran’s nuclear scientists — and provided a glimpse of a covert dirty war that risks spiraling out of hand as tensions rise.
Publicly, there was one unambiguous signal when Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad unveiled new centrifuges he claimed were able to enrich uranium more quickly — to a resounding lack of interest at home or abroad. Experts agreed that this did not constitute a significant advance toward a nuclear capability that Iran insists is peaceful.
Iran’s intention, said Mark Fitzpatrick of the International Institute of Strategic Studies in London, was to show it would not be impeded by sanctions, sabotage or assassinations.
“These announcements will further inflame talk of military options, which has reached feverish pitch in some quarters in Israel and the US, but even in the highly unlikely event that everything Iran has announced is true, it would still take Iran a couple of years to produce a handful of weapons,” he said.
Ahmadinejad’s news, sniffed the US Department of State, was “not terribly new, and not terribly impressive.”
However, in a year that has seen confirmation that Iran is producing 20 percent enriched uranium, stored in a bombproof mountain near Qom, US aircraft carriers sailing through the Strait of Hormuz and the imposition of painful new Western sanctions, this issue is not going away.
Israel’s warnings that it faces an “existential threat” from a nuclear-armed Iran have created an ominous sense that a decision is imminent — piling pressure on US President Barack Obama in election year. Israel, an undeclared nuclear power, is said to be recalculating its options every day. However, bluff, rhetoric and misinformation are likely to be part of this story, too. So are divisions in Israel, where Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says that sanctions are not working, while Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak thinks they are starting to be effective.
Complicating it all is uncertainty over who calls the shots in Tehran, where Ahmadinejad is in a power struggle with Iranian supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who controls the Revolutionary Guards and threatened in a recent sermon to punish Israel.
Wednesday’s announcement of a ban on oil sales to six EU countries is a case in point. EU sanctions banning Iranian oil imports were agreed last month, but were not due to be implemented until July. So the announcement — immediately denied — looked foolish and counter-productive.
“It’s a symptom of a headless government,” said Vahe Petrossian, an energy expert. “They are just making things up as they go along.”
Fears of a low turnout in next month’s parliamentary election (being boycotted by an opposition that never accepted the legitimacy of Ahmadinejad’s “stolen” second term in 2009) is a factor. Another is the deteriorating economic situation, with sanctions biting hard.
“There is a real malaise about the whole system,” Ansari said. “Some of my friends think it is terminal.”
Hardliners are said to find sanctions a useful way of reinforcing their view of unremitting hostility from the West and Israel.
“Israel is a convenient bogeyman,” political scientist Arshin Adib-Moghaddam said. “Cyclical, confined confrontation with Israel is politically useful.”
Yet the risks are obvious.
“Some of the things that have happened are signs of desperation and recklessness,” a Western diplomat said.
Another Tehran-watcher saw an alarming combination of “belligerence and schizophrenia.”
Nor is all well in the region. True, Iran has been influential in Iraq since the overthrow of former Iraqi president Saddam Hussein and is a big player in Afghanistan as well, but it now risks losing Syria, its only Arab ally and link to Hezbollah, its partner in Lebanon.
“Iran’s internal problems are far greater than they seem and beyond the region, its external power is marginal,” political analyst Baqer Moin said.
Emile Hokayem of the Institute of Strategic Studies saw only bombast, risk-taking and incompetence in recent moves: “The Iranians may win something in terms of perception, but all in all, they are on the losing side.”
Iran’s military capabilities are no match for its enemies, but its forces are tough, battle-hardened and motivated: The naval arm of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard has experience in “assymetric warfare” using swarm tactics with fast boats, missiles and mines that could play havoc in the Strait of Hormuz.
“Iran’s friends and enemies both overestimate its power, but if you look at the substance, Iran doesn’t come across as a particularly powerful country,” Hokayem said. “It’s trying to find its place in the international system and it’s failing. We need to rightsize the Iranian challenge.”
Recently, China launched another diplomatic offensive against Taiwan, improperly linking its “one China principle” with UN General Assembly Resolution 2758 to constrain Taiwan’s diplomatic space. After Taiwan’s presidential election on Jan. 13, China persuaded Nauru to sever diplomatic ties with Taiwan. Nauru cited Resolution 2758 in its declaration of the diplomatic break. Subsequently, during the WHO Executive Board meeting that month, Beijing rallied countries including Venezuela, Zimbabwe, Belarus, Egypt, Nicaragua, Sri Lanka, Laos, Russia, Syria and Pakistan to reiterate the “one China principle” in their statements, and assert that “Resolution 2758 has settled the status of Taiwan” to hinder Taiwan’s
Can US dialogue and cooperation with the communist dictatorship in Beijing help avert a Taiwan Strait crisis? Or is US President Joe Biden playing into Chinese President Xi Jinping’s (習近平) hands? With America preoccupied with the wars in Europe and the Middle East, Biden is seeking better relations with Xi’s regime. The goal is to responsibly manage US-China competition and prevent unintended conflict, thereby hoping to create greater space for the two countries to work together in areas where their interests align. The existing wars have already stretched US military resources thin, and the last thing Biden wants is yet another war.
As Maldivian President Mohamed Muizzu’s party won by a landslide in Sunday’s parliamentary election, it is a good time to take another look at recent developments in the Maldivian foreign policy. While Muizzu has been promoting his “Maldives First” policy, the agenda seems to have lost sight of a number of factors. Contemporary Maldivian policy serves as a stark illustration of how a blend of missteps in public posturing, populist agendas and inattentive leadership can lead to diplomatic setbacks and damage a country’s long-term foreign policy priorities. Over the past few months, Maldivian foreign policy has entangled itself in playing
A group of Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) lawmakers led by the party’s legislative caucus whip Fu Kun-chi (?) are to visit Beijing for four days this week, but some have questioned the timing and purpose of the visit, which demonstrates the KMT caucus’ increasing arrogance. Fu on Wednesday last week confirmed that following an invitation by Beijing, he would lead a group of lawmakers to China from Thursday to Sunday to discuss tourism and agricultural exports, but he refused to say whether they would meet with Chinese officials. That the visit is taking place during the legislative session and in the aftermath