Iran
Takes The Wind Out Of US Sails
By Jim Lobe
06 April, 2007
Inter Press Service
WASHINGTON -
If the administration of US President George W Bush is paying attention,
the drama over the 15 British sailors and marines, whose release by
Iran after 12 days of detention was announced in Tehran on Wednesday,
was designed to convey two key messages, according to experts in Washington.
First, the initial capture
of the Britons by Revolutionary Guards near the entry to the disputed
Shatt-al-Arab waterway was meant to demonstrate that, despite its conventional
military weakness and diplomatic isolation, Iran retains the ability
to strike at Western interests when it feels sufficiently provoked.
Second, when Western powers
engage Iran with respect and as an equal, they are more likely to get
what they want than when they take a confrontational path designed to
bully or humiliate the regime.
Neither message is likely
to be well received either at the White House or among the neo-conservative
and other right-wing pundits who have tried hard to depict the incident
as the latest sign of Islamic or Persian barbarism. Properly understood,
however, the messages could form the basis of a new approach capable
of yielding still greater results, according to Juan Cole, a regional
expert at the University of Michigan.
"The British have now
opened a channel," he said. "Although this incident really
did constitute a crisis - one that might have escalated to very dangerous
levels - the resolution was diplomatic, and that diplomatic resolution
could contain the seeds for future diplomacy, if the British and the
Americans are so inclined."
The announcement that the
sailors were being released in honor of the Prophet Mohammed's forthcoming
birthday and the Christian Easter holiday was made by President Mahmud
Ahmadinejad, who then met with the captives personally.
"Our government has
pardoned them; it is a gift from our people," he said, adding that
the gesture had "nothing to do" with Tuesday's release in
Iraq of a senior Iranian diplomat who was abducted two months ago reportedly
by a special Iraqi intelligence agency that works closely with the US
Central Intelligence Agency. "We approached the subject on a humanitarian
basis. It was a unilateral decision on our end," he insisted.
Nonetheless, the diplomat's
release, as well as reports that Tehran also just received assurances
that it will be given consular access to five alleged Revolutionary
Guards seized by US forces at an Iranian liaison office in Irbil nearly
three months ago, suggest that Wednesday's events were more than just
coincidence, although both London and Washington, like Ahmadinejad,
insist there were no quids pro quo.
"I personally believe
that the US action [in Irbil] ... accounts for why Iran chose to stage
its capture of the British sailors," said Gary Sick, an Iran expert
at Columbia University who served in the White House under president
Jimmy Carter. "Iran appears to have gained something from its pressure
tactics."
That assessment was shared
by Trita Parsi, president of the US National Iranian American Council.
"By taking the [British] soft targets, the Iranians put pressure
on the US."
In addition to collecting
bargaining chips, the original capture had other purposes, including
rallying nationalist sentiment behind the regime just as it faced the
imposition by the United Nations Security Council of a new round of
sanctions for rejecting demands to suspend its uranium-enrichment program.
As important, however, was
the message Tehran wished to convey to the West that it could indeed
respond to what it saw as US provocations in ways that could harm or
embarrass its allies.
"In seizing the Iranians,
who, after all, had been invited by the Iraqi authorities, the Americans
were seen as behaving aggressively," said Cole. "Now the Iranians
have demonstrated that the Anglo-American forces are not in a strong
enough position to afford to do these things. They can play tit-for-tat."
Sick agreed: "It is
a reminder that Iran has quite an array of asymmetrical options available
to it to counter indirectly the actions of the US forces in Iraq and
elsewhere."
At the same time, according
to Sick, Tehran's behavior during much of the crisis - including both
the seizure itself, the precise location of which remains a matter of
dispute, and its use of "confessions" by the British captives
and threats to put them on trial - will probably have cost it much-needed
international support.
"I suspect that recognition
of this fact accounts for Iran's desire to end this dispute as promptly
as possible," said Sick. "For the same reason, I suspect that
this ploy will not be repeated any time soon."
Parsi said: "I think
the Iranians thought it was better to declare victory and put an end
to the crisis before there was any further escalation."
At the same time, however,
Parsi and other analysts said the point at which victory could be declared
was reached because of important changes in the British approach to
the crisis.
London officials have said
the turning point came on Monday, when Ali Larijani, the Iranian national
security adviser, gave a conciliatory interview to Britain's Channel
Four television - an interview that was followed up the next day with
a critical conversation between Larijani and British Prime Minister
Tony Blair's top foreign-policy adviser, Sir Nigel Sheinwald, according
to The Independent. However, Cole pointed to a shift in the British
stance from one of threats and demands to a more diplomatic approach
over the weekend, including confirmation by British Defense Secretary
Des Browne that London was "in direct bilateral communication with
the Iranians".
"These sorts of incidents
are always to some extent about face, and apparently the Iranians felt
that when Britain agreed to enter into direct bilateral negotiations,
Iran had gained enough face to be magnanimous," Cole said. "On
Sunday, they were admitted as equals, not scolded as little children.
That created the opening for [Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali] Khameini
and Ahmadinejad to climb down and save face."
William Beeman, an Iran expert
at the University of Minnesota, said: "Iranians have been signaling
repeatedly, and not just during this crisis, that they will engage diplomatically,
but without preconditions and on the basis of equality. So now they
say, 'You see, when we have the upper hand, you see how magnanimous
we are; we are a charitable, civilized people. We are reasonable. You
can talk with us.'"
Parsi said: "The Iranian
message is that if you deal with us respectfully, through incentives,
then things can get resolved rather quickly. If you only resort to force
or impose sanctions at the UN Security Council, then you'll only get
stuck, and Iran will respond in kind. They're hoping that the West gets
the impression that that is the incentive structure through which it
can make progress with Iran. Whether that will be understood in the
West is obviously a complete different question."
The Bush administration's
relative silence during the crisis may also have conveyed, inadvertently
perhaps, another message - that, despite widespread speculation that
its recent military buildup in the Persian Gulf is intended to prepare
the grounds for an attack on Iran, it has no wish to do so, at least
for the moment.
"The Iranian capture
of 15 [British] military personnel could certainly have been used as
... a pretext [for a military strike], since it could easily have escalated
to a full-fledged military crisis," said Sick. "I regard the
absence of unbridled escalation in this case as a significant indicator
that the US desire for a strike may be more muted than it has been portrayed."
(Inter Press Service)
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