This weeks visit to several European cities by President Bush has been widely welcomed as an opportunity to improve transatlantic relations in the light of the many policy divisions between the United States and leading European Union states. But in one area Iran his comments were the opposite of reassuring to those concerned about the possibility of a new and dangerous military confrontation.
It was widely reported that Bush, in his press conference on 22 February, described suggestions that the United States might attack Iran as ridiculous. This is one occasion when the full quotation is worth recording:
After all, Great Britain, Germany and France are negotiating with the Ayatollahs to achieve a common objective, something that we all want, and that is for them not to have a nuclear weapon. Its in our interests for them not to have a nuclear weapon.
And finally, this notion that the United States is getting ready to attack Iran is simply ridiculous. And having said that, all options are on the table. (Laughter.)
At next days joint press conference with Germanys Chancellor Schröder, a combination of agreement (Iran should not develop nuclear weapons) and disagreement (over what should be done to prevent this) was apparent. The European view embodied in the European Union 3 (Germany, France, Britain) that has conducted intensive consultation with Tehran is that diplomacy is the best means of achieving the preferred outcome. In European eyes, this would be to allow Iran to develop a relatively small nuclear-power programme, but one that lacks an indigenous capacity for uranium enrichment (given that this can, under certain circumstances, form the basis for enriching uranium to weapons grade). In exchange, Iran would be granted progressive improvements in trade and other aspects of interstate relations.
Within Iran, even this more flexible European policy is deeply unpopular across a wide range of political and religious circles. Iranian leaders are aware that United States policy presents to them a menu of five pressing strategic challenges. First, the worlds sole superpower has labelled their country part of an axis of evil. Second, in pursuit of its clear strategy of pre-empting perceived threats, the US has already terminated regimes on either side of Iran (the Taliban in Afghanistan and the Saddam Hussein regime in Iraq). The US may be facing formidable problems in Iraq, but it retains 150,000 troops there, is building permanent bases and is about to construct a large new military installation near Herat in western Afghanistan, close to Irans eastern border. Third, it sanctions an Israeli military presence in the Kurdish region of Iraq close to Irans western border. Fourth, the United States navy has almost total control of the Persian Gulf and the Arabian sea.
The fifth challenge goes to the heart of the Iranians sense of strategic encirclement: the possession of formidable nuclear forces by the United States and Israel combined with their adamant opposition to any prospect of Iran itself possessing such weapons.
This Iranian perspective cuts no ice in the United States or Israel, which regard Iran as a far more significant threat than Saddam Husseins Iraq ever was, and which are deeply suspicious of such a populous, oil-rich country even wanting to consider a civil nuclear-power programme.
The music of the drones
In this tense strategic climate, two issues are of particular concern: the significance of the recent US deployment of surveillance drones into Iranian air space, and the chances of the US accepting a tougher version of the European proposals (in the unlikely event that they were agreed by Tehran).
There is now reliable evidence that the US has been using bases in Iraq for nearly a year to undertake extensive surveillance missions across Iran. This recent information fills in some of the detail of Seymour Hershs New Yorker article (17 January 2005), and the column of 20 January in this series, on moves towards a confrontation with Iran.
The drone missions have two distinct purposes: to probe Iranian air defences and to collect information on nuclear sites (see Dafna Linzer, U.S. Uses Drones to Probe Iran For Arms, Washington Post, 13 February 2005). The US seeks to provoke the use of Iranian air-defence radars in order to gauge their effectiveness. An Iranian attempt to destroy some of the drones would have been useful to the US military in this respect; instead, the Iranians tried neither to intercept nor (except on rare occasions) even to illuminate the drones with radar, thereby limiting US attempts to probe any weaknesses.
At the same time, the effect of this activity is to convince the Iranian military that the United States is indeed preparing for the option of military attacks. This raises the question of whether there could be sufficient changes in Iranian nuclear programmes to satisfy Washington.
To date, negotiations with the EU3 have resulted in the Paris agreement of November 2004, which required Iran to freeze uranium enrichment in return for possible economic, trade and technology concessions. The agreement is voluntary rather than legally binding under current international agreements; Iran could still, if it wishes, embark on uranium enrichment for civil nuclear-power purposes within the terms of the non-proliferation treaty and under the inspection processes of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).
If Iran did resume enrichment, it is also possible (though not legally necessary) that the IAEA and Iran could agree even tighter verification procedures that would make it very difficult to switch to the rapid development of a nuclear-weapons programme. Irans response in such circumstances is difficult to measure: there is substantial expertise in the country on nuclear issues, some of it dating back to the Shahs ambitious nuclear programme of the 1970s, and it may even be possible for Iran to embark on the more efficient plutonium route to nuclear weapons.
There are, however, economic reasons for Iran to pursue its own uranium-enrichment programme. Producing reactor-grade uranium for the Bushehr nuclear-power plant, for example, would probably be substantially cheaper than buying it from Russia (see Kaveh L Afrasiabi, The Peace Pipes on the Table, Asia Times, 23 February 2005).
At present, Iran seems prepared to negotiate with the EU3 on the uranium-enrichment issue, and may be prepared to accept a long-term pause in its programme if the rewards were big enough. But these would have to include not just further trade and technology-transfer concessions, but some kind of security guarantee that would simply have to involve Washington.
Will America invade Iran?
This is the crux of the matter: what will really determine whether the United States, or indeed Israel, will target Irans nuclear facilities in the coming months. Put bluntly, what must Iran do to make it certain that the Bush administration will not attack it?
This question is posed in starkly practical terms to policy-makers and opinion-formers in Iran. They ask: would it be enough for Iran to return to enriching uranium for civil purposes but under an extremely stringent IAEA verification regime (far tougher than anything imposed on other countries)? Almost certainly, this would not satisfy Washington. So would it therefore become necessary for Iran to abandon all indigenous enrichment programmes, maintaining its relatively small nuclear-power programme solely with imported fuel?
Many in Tehran think that even this would not be enough. The more hardline, neo-conservative rhetoric emanating from Washington, and the recent military surveillance of Iran, convince them that the United States will be satisfied only if Iran abandons all civil nuclear activities, including any substantive research programmes. Indeed, the more intransigent leaders in Tehran believe that the sum total of US attitudes is to present a front behind which is a defined plan for regime termination.
A number of Washingtons many voices certainly do advocate regime change, but the more influential view there is probably that a total Iranian abandonment of all its civil nuclear programmes might be enough. This is still far more then the EU3 are asking for, and certainly far more than Iran will concede. Thus, whatever gloss George W Bushs visit has put on transatlantic relations, there really is a major gap between the United States and the European Union.
It is just possible that the EU3 will be able to exert sufficient pressure on Washington to persuade it to hold back from military action against Iran. Against a mood in influential circles in Washington that sees Iran as unfinished business, this would require formidable diplomatic persistence. In brief, whatever the massive dangers of embarking on military action against Iran which could be far greater even than those created by the Iraq war it is by no means certain that even a united commitment from Germany, France and Britain can deter the George W Bush administration.
