In the act of denouncing the recent Israeli-Palestinian-Arab conference under US-Soviet auspices in Madrid, Iran has made another bold move for leadership of the Muslim world. This has long-term perhaps significant implications for India as well. The denunciation of the conference as ‘treason’ has come from Ayatollah Sayed Ali Khamenei, successor to Ayatollah Khomeini as spiritual guide, and the call for jihad (holy war) and the killing of participants has been given by Ali Akbar Mohtashemi, a former Interior Minister.
Iranians had convened a meeting of their supporters in Teheran in anticipation of the Madrid conference with a view to undermining the effort to hold it. They did not succeed. But that did not persuade them to wait and watch. They denounced the conference as it opened in Madrid as a “confrontation with Islam” and as a “declaration of war on Islam,” calling for the “death sentence” for participants “according to Islamic law,” to quote Mohtashemi.
In view of President Rafsanjani’s silence, these declarations can be interpreted as part of an ongoing power struggle between the ‘moderates’ headed by him and the ‘hardliners’ led by Ayatollah Khamenei. But there is more to it than that. President Rafsanjani is apparently a pragmatist keen to repair the damage to the economy caused by the eight-year-long war with Iraq, on the one hand, and the radicalism of the early period of the revolution, on the other. It is necessary for him to renew contacts with the West so that he can secure access to technology and investment.
In this enterprise, he has been eminently successful, as is evident from the visits of President Mitterrand and other leaders to Teheran and the response of Western business and industry. But it does not follow that he has ceased to believe in the Islamic revolution. If President Rafsanjani were not an ardent believer, he could have survived in that august office only if the revolution had begun to peter out and he could depend on the support of a power centre such as the army which is not infused with the revolutionary spirit. There is no evidence that this is the case. The revolution is alive and the army in Iran, unlike in Pakistan, for example, is not an autonomous institution.
Iran has not been and cannot afford to be interested in a headlong confrontation since the end of the war with Iraq. In the wake of the Gulf war last winter, for instance, it quietly backed away from support for Shias in southern Iraq as it became obvious that President Saddam Hussein was still strong and determined enough to put down the revolt with a heavy hand.
Since then, it has mended fences even with Saudi Arabia, which not only invited US and other ‘infidel’ troops into its territory in an emergency, but continues to pursue a long-term policy of collaboration with the West. By the same logic, it has been helpful in the release of American hostages held by its supporters in Lebanon.
But revolutions are known to mark time. The Soviet Union under Stalin is an example. The concept of socialism in one country was as much a signal to the rest of the world that the Soviet Union was not interested in exporting revolution as it was an admission that after the defeat of the Red Army in Poland and the failure of the communist putsch in Germany, Moscow had to attend first to domestic problems. And during World War II, Stalin disbanded the Communist International (Comintern) in order to reassure his Western allies. The export of revolution truly began after Stalin’s death in 1953. The arms deal with Egypt in 1955 was the first move in that direction.
By the same token, it is necessary for Iranians to mark time if they are not to court disaster. The collapse of the Soviet Union has given the United States and its allies a freedom of action which makes it dangerous for Iran to provoke them unduly. The example of Saddam Hussein clinches the issue. China is neither capable of, nor interested in, trying to redress the power imbalance that has resulted from the disintegration of the Soviet Union. Of necessity, Iran has to follow a two-track strategy, to strengthen itself both economically and militarily, and preserve its Islamic appeal. It is attending to the first task under the leadership of President Rafsanjani and to the second under that of Ayatollah Khamenei and other “radicals’.
Not that Iranian leaders are playing with divided cards. It would be surprising if there were no difference of opinion among them on priorities. Factionalism is normal in politics. The point to note is whether Iran’s twin needs are being well met under the present dispensation. Apparently, they are. Both ‘radical’ and ‘moderate’ groups existed when Ayatollah Khomeini was around. He could tilt towards one or the other, depending on his appreciation of the revolution’s requirements. Since neither President Rafsanjani nor Ayatollah Khamenei has taken his place, some kind of tension in the leadership is unavoidable. But its importance should not be exaggerated. Their partnership may have an adversarial dimension, but it remains a partnership.
‘Moderate’ Iranian leaders have as much reason to be concerned over moves to exclude Iran from the US-supervised order in the Gulf as ‘hardliners’. They must, therefore, be as anxious to undermine it as their supposed rivals. It may be an exaggeration to say that Washington is making an example of Iraq in order to send a signal to Iran. But it is inconceivable that the Iranians would not see it that way. Indeed, the Deputy President, Ayatollah Mohajerani, would not have criticised the destruction of Iraq’s nuclear facilities publicly if that had not been so. Teheran is convinced that the security arrangements the United States is seeking to promote in the Gulf are directed primarily against it.
By virtue of its geography, history, population and potentialities, Iran is entitled to regard itself as the pre-eminent power in the Gulf. It cannot but resent deeply any arrangement which denies it a decisive say in regional affairs. Under the Shah, it sought to assert its pre-eminence as an ally of the United States. The Islamic revolutionary regime was trying to develop a viable alternative when it found itself at war with Iraq, partly as a result of that effort, which involved appeals to the people over the head of governments. The Iran-Iraq war was barely over when Saddam Hussein plunged the region into one vast confusion from which it has yet to emerge. Understandably, Teheran is busy working out an appropriate strategy.
Iran’s alleged search for nuclear weapons should be seen in that context. The first significant report appeared in The Washington Post only late last month (reproduced in the International Herald Tribune on October 31). The US intelligence community has no doubt been following developments in the nuclear field in Iran for quite some time before someone decided to speak to The Washington Post. The alleged purchase by Iran from China of calutron equipment capable of producing highly enriched uranium has clearly been one ‘provocation’, and the statement by the Iranian Deputy President another. He has been quoted by the official Iranian press agency, IRNA, as saying that “because the enemy has nuclear facilities, the Muslim states should be equipped with the same capacity”.
Iran has denied that it is seeking to acquire a nuclear-weapons capability, and China has said that its cooperation with Iran is limited to peaceful purposes. But such denials are routine. While China’s credibility is particularly low in this regard in view of its record over the years, especially in relation to Pakistan whom it is known to have provided even a design of a nuclear device, it is difficult to accept that Iran can be serious about leading the Islamic revolution and yet shun nuclear weapons.
Sunday Mail, 17 November 1991