Sabre Rattling in the Persian Gulf

You can’t negotiate when you tell the other side, “Give us what a negotiation would produce before the negotiation starts.” (Michael Hirsh and Maziar Bahari, Rumors of War, Newsweek, February 19, 2007)


The drumbeats have begun for another war in the Middle East. This time it’s against Iran. President Bush’s assembling of a formidable naval force in the Persian Gulf, Iran’s doorsteps, has caused an unmistakable stir in the news media. Some believe it’s just a political gerrymandering to divert attention away from Iraq and the ongoing political battle between the Democrat majority based Congress and the White House; others believe it is the first step towards war with Iran. They argue that the administration is provoking Iran to take a misstep and provide excuse for the U.S. to launch a retaliatory attack. The situation is fraught with danger.

Although the administration is denying such a scenario, “the Pentagon does have contingency plans for all-out war with Iran, on which Bush was briefed last summer. The targets would include Iran’s air-defense systems, its nuclear and chemical weapon facilities, ballistic missile sites, naval and Revolutionary Guard bases in the gulf, and intelligence headquarters,” (Rumors of War, Newsweek, February 19, 2007). There is no contention that the U.S. has the entire wherewithal, and some more, to execute such a preemptive attack but will it give it any substantial advantage in the long run? The generals and the military analysts do not believe so. For instance, Hirsh and Bahari (Rumors of War) continue, “But generals are convinced that no amount of firepower could do more than delay Tehran’s nuclear program. U.S. military analysts have concluded that noting short of regime change would completely eliminate the threat – and America simply doesn’t have the troops needed.” Such an attack would at best be a half-measure.

In order to prepare ground for such an action, the administration has started a vigorous propaganda campaign. Among other things, the U.S. accused Iran of supplying weaponry to the Shiite militia in Iraq which was allegedly used against the American army. According to USA TODAY (February 12, 2007), “U.S. military officials who declined request to be identified, said Sunday that shipments of weapons and ammunition to Iraq’s Shiite militia were being directed at the highest level of the Iranian government… In a briefing, U.S. officials showed reporters part of a device they described as a sophisticated roadside bomb along with mortar shells and rocket-propelled grenades they said were made in Iran. Later, one of the officials, an intelligence analyst, said it would be impossible to find a ‘smoking gun’ conclusively proving Iranian government involvement.”

More significant are the comments made by General Pace, the newly appointed Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, in Australia on his trip to Canberra. According to Voice of America’s Al Pessin, Pace said, “We know that the explosively formed projectiles are manufactured in Iran. What I would not say is that the Iranian government, per se, knows about this…It is clear that materials from Iran are involved, but I would not say by what I know that the Iranian government clearly knows or is complicit.” Later, the U.S. Defense Secretary, Robert Gates, said more or less the same thing. In the face of such assertions, President Bush has retracted from his earlier statement asserting the complicity of the highest leaders of the Iranian government. According to Yahoo!News (February 15, 2007), “Bush said at a news conference Wednesday he has no doubt the Iranian government is providing armor-piercing weapons to kill American troops in Iraq. But he backed away from claims by senior U.S. military officials in Baghdad that the top echelon of Iran’s government was responsible.”

The motive of the U.S. administration in accusing the Iranian government of complicity is also at present questioned by some skeptics. According to boston.com (February 14, 2007), “..U.S. officials in Iraq and their British counterparts have known for more than two years that armor-piercing explosives were being smuggled from Iran, but had never displayed them to the media until Sunday, prompting critics to ask why the administration is choosing this moment to highlight the alleged misdeeds of the Iranian regime.” They think there is something fishy about the administration’s intentions against Iran.

They smell a rat for another reason. Most of the deaths of American soldiers in Iraq were caused by the Sunni insurgents and not by the Shiite militia which have links with Iran.

Another bone of contention is Iran’s nuclear program which it has refused to forgo so far. Both U.S. and Israel are making too much of Iran’s nuclear ambitions. Even if Iran proceeded unchecked with its program, it wouldn’t be able to manufacture any bomb before ten or fifteen years according to some analysts who are following Iran’s moves closely. Will it ever have nuclear power to match that of Israel or the U.S? In this regard, France’s president Jacques Chirac’s comments which he made recently (and withdrew soon afterwards) are very enlightening. According to The New York Sun (February 2, 2007), he said, “Having one or perhaps a second bomb a little later, well, that’s not very dangerous…He speculated that Iran would never use a nuclear weapon on Israel because it would not have gone 200 meters into the atmosphere before Tehran would be razed.” And that is quite true. Iran is no threat to the U.S. or Israel. Waging a war of words is not the same thing as starting an actual war. It is however true that the newly acquired power coupled with nuclear capability by Iran will change the political equation in the Middle East favoring Iran vis a vis the other Arab States.

After the experience with Iraq war and the cooked-up evidence pertaining to the weapons of mass destruction for which Iraq was invaded, the American public has become wary of the administration’s intentions and its strategies in the Middle East. It does not have stomach for another war. Also, the administration doesn’t have a blank check from the congress to start another war. Previously, the Republican dominated congress had routinely rubberstamped all the administration’s plans and initiatives in the Middle East. Now, the shoe is on the other foot. The congress is presently dominated by the Democrats who are not willing to go along with the president without asking probing and sometime uncomfortable (for the administration) questions and getting appropriate answers without evasion. Although it has not yet asserted itself effectively, the congress is in no mood to start another war. They want to give peaceful negotiations a chance to resolve the issues in the Middle East. The administration has rejected such plans. It has setup preconditions for the negotiations. For instance, it requires Iran to dismantle its nuclear program first before any negotiations can take place. Once Iran agrees to forsake its nuclear program, what else is there for it to negotiate?

The president has declared that he is the decider implying he can go to war if it is in the national interest. The congress is contesting it. The congress has said repeatedly that the president needs approval before he starts another war; the approval for Iraq war is not a blanket approval for all wars. This issue will be contested fiercely. This is also the test of the viability of democracy in the U.S.

The administration’s policy of preemptive wars has marginalized the role of the United Nations. This is very dangerous for the world peace.
Discussing the advisability of peaceful negotiations, The Nation (issue of May 22, 2006) argued, “American efforts to deny Iran what neighboring countries, including Israel and Pakistan, already have can be portrayed as yet another injustice at the hands of Washington. Thus the more the United States pushes Iran to stop uranium enrichment, the more it is likely to turn the nuclear issue into a cause that’s all about defending the country’s sovereignty and dignity. In contrast, involving Iran in a regional discussion about stabilizing the Persian Gulf could go a long way toward satisfying Iran’s pride and diminishing its appetite for nukes.” The Nation concluded by observing, “Saner voices must offer an alternative to the Administration’s endgame: an alternative that recognizes that the international community has time to deal with Iran’s nuclear ambitions and also that we must address legitimate Iranian security concerns, taking seriously the idea of a region free of all weapons of mass destruction. This larger vision would require the United States to be willing to give up its own nuclear option, and thus won’t be realized overnight. But this is the kind of diplomacy we should demand of our national leaders, not diplomacy that leads to more war and instability.”