[Mb-civic] To Tame Tehran - Michael McFaul and Abbas Milani - Washington Post Op-Ed

[William Swiggard]

To Tame Tehran

By Michael McFaul and Abbas Milani
Saturday, January 28, 2006; A21

In response to Tehran's foolish decision to restart its nuclear 
enrichment program, the U.N. Security Council finally got serious about 
dealing with the Iranian threat. If Tehran does not accept Moscow's 
offer to enrich uranium for Iran on Russian soil, a U.N. censure of Iran 
seems likely. Anything less will affirm the assessment of hard-liners in 
Tehran that the United States is too weak to achieve its basic foreign 
policy objectives regarding Iran.

But then what? Passing a Security Council resolution is a necessary but 
far from sufficient step for addressing the threat from the Islamic 
republic. New sanctions, even if they included oil, would not undermine 
the Iranian regime. A more farsighted, comprehensive strategy for 
reducing the Iranian menace to international security must include the 
development of an alliance with those inside Iran who also see the 
dangers of the regime's adventurism. Ironically, President Mahmoud 
Ahmadinejad and his dangerous foreign policy initiatives abroad, 
combined with his bankrupt and increasingly oppressive policies at home, 
have helped create favorable conditions for forging such an alliance.

On the surface, the regime in Tehran seems to stand together in 
supporting Iran's more confrontational foreign policy stances. Behind 
the scenes, however, a fierce struggle is underway. In one camp is 
Ahmadinejad, his supporters in the Revolutionary Guards and the 
paramilitary force known as the Basijis, and messianic fundamentalists 
inspired by the teachings of Ayatollah Mesbah-Yazdi. In the other camp 
is not only Iran's embattled democratic movement but also an array of 
forces that benefited from the status quo before Ahmadinejad came to 
power, including the head of the Expediency Council: Ali Akbar Hashemi 
Rafsanjani.

Unexpectedly, Ahmadinejad has pushed hard to remove from power many 
experienced high- and mid-level government officials, including those 
previously handling the nuclear negotiations, and to replace them with 
unqualified loyalists from the security services and the Basijis. Not 
surprisingly, these fired professionals have quietly begun to regroup to 
push back, and, significantly, their efforts have not been checked by 
the supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Until recently Khamenei had 
backed Ahmadinejad as a way to restrain the powers of Rafsanjani, but 
now Khamenei is gently seeking ways to rein in the new president and 
those spiritual zealots close to him, such as Mesbah-Yazdi, who threaten 
the supreme leader's authority.

If this split in the regime deepens, Ahmadinejad will not be able to 
rely on widespread support in Iranian society. In last year's 
presidential election, Ahmadinejad ran a clever campaign as an outsider 
and critic of the status quo. He rallied electoral support not by 
promising to remove Israel from the face of the earth but by pledging to 
fight corruption and support the poor. In power, however, Ahmadinejad 
quickly undermined his anti-corruption credentials by appointing his 
relatives to government positions, and then tried to change the subject 
by launching repressive policies at home and exacerbating tensions 
abroad. Economic woes, new restrictions on social freedoms and 
disappointed expectations mean that popular support for his Khomeini 
renaissance is shallow.

These developments create opportunities for Western leaders well beyond 
U.N. votes. First, and most obviously, the United States must take 
advantage of the current climate to further isolate and marginalize 
Ahmadinejad and his cabal and hold them responsible for the crisis. 
Calls for constructive engagement with Iran's president are wrong; such 
overtures would only confirm Ahmadinejad's contention that 
confrontational policies reap rewards.

Second, U.S. and European leaders must do more to stimulate a serious 
discussion in Iranian society about the country's security interests, 
and articulate policies and arguments that will strengthen an Iranian 
political coalition against nuclear weapons. So far the Tehran regime 
has monopolized the discussion. Though disguised in assertions about 
Iran's right to nuclear energy, the strategic thinking of the regime has 
been quite simple: The United States invaded Iraq because Iraq did not 
have nuclear weapons; the United States has not invaded North Korea 
because North Korea has nuclear weapons.

The flaws in this logic must be exposed. In a major public address, 
President Bush should pledge that the United States will never attack a 
nonnuclear Iran, while also underscoring that the Iranian process of 
acquiring nuclear weapons capabilities actually increases the likelihood 
of military confrontation with the United States. Western leaders should 
remind Iranian society that a nuclear Iran would also trigger a nuclear 
arms race in the region, as Egypt and Saudi Arabia would move quickly to 
develop their own arsenals.

Third, Bush should endorse the idea of creating a regional security 
organization in the Middle East, which would include Iran. Like the 
Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe during the Cold War, 
this new organization could begin to provide security guarantees between 
Middle East states as well as those outside the region. A more secure 
Iran would create better conditions for the reemergence of a 
pro-Western, peaceful, democratic movement inside the country. The 
specter of armed conflict with the United States only helps Ahmadinejad 
consolidate his power.

Ahmadinejad's threat to external security and internal freedoms is 
bringing forth an opposition coalition that sees more clearly the 
dangers of confrontation with the West. A nimble U.S. policy, one that 
plots a strategy beyond the next Security Council vote, can help these 
forces inside Iran succeed.

The writers are research fellows and co-directors of the Iran Democracy 
Project at the Hoover Institution.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/01/27/AR2006012701206.html
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