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Tuesday, Feb 9, 2010
The complex nation whose leader once called America "the Great Satan" -- and whose people cheer our soccer teams -- may play an increasingly important role in American strategic planning.
Oct 1, 2001 | As the United States struggles to put together a coalition against world terrorism, it is being forced to take a crash course in the topsy-turvy politics of the Middle East, where yesterday's enemies may be tomorrow's friends. And one of the most intriguing players -- and a potential U.S. strategic partner -- is a state that just a few years ago was one of America's most implacable enemies: Iran.
In an act reflecting a convergence of U.S.-Iranian interests -- not the first such overlap in recent years -- the Iranian government gave tacit support to the United States' efforts to target Osama bin Laden, whom the Bush administration has described as the prime suspect in the Sept. 11 attacks on the World Trade Center. President Mohammad Khatami has reportedly signaled to the U.S. that his government would not oppose military strikes against specific targets in Afghanistan.
Iran's support for U.S. action is highly qualified. But the fact that it signed on at all to Bush's campaign against terrorism opens the possibility of a thaw between the two nations.
Mention Iran to the average American and what comes to mind is the grim face of the Ayatollah Khomeini denouncing America as "the Great Satan" and the humiliating, 444-day national ordeal that ensued after Islamic revolutionaries stormed the U.S. Embassy in Tehran. But the image of Iran as the ultimate anti-American Islamic state is misleading. Times have changed. Iran is by no means a free and open society, but it has made significant strides toward democracy. It has a relatively large and comparatively Westernized middle class and a complicated political situation that includes a strong moderate faction as well as fundamentalist clerics. Iran is not an Arab state: About half of Iranians are Persians, ethnically distinct from Arabs and heirs to a great ancient empire. This distinction cannot be ignored when assessing Iran's political and cultural realities.
And it is strategically vital. Slightly larger than Alaska, it is the largest Middle Eastern country after the vast, empty Saudi Arabia, bordering Iraq, Turkey, Azerbaijan, Turkmenistan, Afghanistan and Pakistan. It fronts the Caspian Sea and the Caucasus and has the longest coastline on the Persian Gulf of any nation. It is the third biggest oil exporter in the world, after Saudi Arabia and Norway. At 66 million, its population -- mostly under 30 -- puts it in Egypt and Turkey's class as a regional heavyweight.
The United States and Iran have not had diplomatic relations since 1979, and relations between the two nations remain chilly. But some experts argue that in the current crisis, America can no longer afford not to cultivate Iran. In their view, shared interests could pave the way to cooperation now and improved relations in the future.
Graham Fuller, former vice chairman of the National Intelligence Council, a U.S. government think tank, says that there's an "inexorable pressure" on the United States and Iran to reach rapprochement. "Washington now understands that the costs of not dealing with the most powerful power in the region are too expensive," says Fuller. Pointing out that embracing Iran could help erase the perception that the U.S. is antagonistic to the Muslim world, where U.S. policies have invariably collided with Islamic groups, Fuller says, "At some point, it behooves us to get along with some Islamist regimes that are moving towards fairly moderate policies."
How rapid is that movement? "Iran probably has made more progress towards democratization in the past five years than any other country in the Middle East," Fuller says. Noting that Iran is probably the most liberal and stable Islamic state in the world, Fuller says, "One of its signal features is its diversity -- violent and peaceful, democratic and autocratic, modernist and traditional." He cites "ideas developing in Iran about relationships between Islam and democracy and secularism" as examples of "fresh thinking that's not coming from elsewhere." These new ideas could be crucial in the future, Fuller believes.
Iran is clearly key to maintaining the balance of power both in the Middle East and central Asia. America and Iran come down on the same side of the key issues: containing Iraq, stabilizing Afghanistan, stopping the flow of drugs from Afghanistan and keeping the Persian Gulf open to oil shipments.
The terrorist attacks brought those shared interests into greater relief. Within days of the attacks, Iran sealed its 562-mile border with Afghanistan, fearing a mass exodus from Afghanistan into Iran. While clearly taken in self-interest, Iran's move may make it harder for supporters of Osama bin Laden to escape Afghanistan.
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