Iranian protesters make their point about Britain, the US and Israel Photo: REUTERS
8:36PM GMT 01 Dec 2011
In Iran, the hardline Islamists call Britain “the little Satan”. This is in contrast to the United States, which they call “the Great Satan”. To some extent, the attack on our Embassy in Tehran is part of that positioning: they see us as a serious enemy and think we deserve this deliberate action, because the UK along with the US and Canada has recently cut its banking links with Iran.
The European Union yesterday agreed new sanctions to target people and companies selectively, including the freezing of assets and travel bans. But these were not linked to the storming of the British Embassy on Tuesday. They have postponed (until January) decisions aimed at severely affecting the Iranian financial system, and the energy and transport sector. It is very important that they bring forward these decisions more quickly and also take tough diplomatic measures to demonstrate that an EU member state cannot be picked off.
William Hague is right to try to keep open formal relations in international bodies, even though the two countries’ embassies are closed. It is also very important that we find other ways of keeping open the dialogue with the opposition inside Iran: for it is from the people that fundamental changes will stem. That is the lesson from Tunisia, Egypt, Libya, Bahrain and Syria.
Some believe that military action can settle the Iranian problem. We know the Israeli government was threatening, a few weeks ago, to act unilaterally and take pre-emptive military action by launching a bombing raid on Iranian nuclear installations. Such an overt action would immediately unite all Iranians, the internal opposition included, against Israel and her allies. It is reassuring that the bombing of Iran was opposed by senior military and intelligence figures in Israel: hopefully they have been listened to, and Israel is instead taking clandestine measures. It is significant that in Isfahan on Monday there was a blast on the edge of the city that struck a uranium enrichment facility, the second such incident in a month. It is possible that Israeli intelligence is involved and it is almost certain that Iranian citizens were.
The Israelis took pre-emptive action in Iraq in 1981 over the Osirak reactor and in Syria in 2008 over a reactor supplied by North Korea. These precedents, however, are not remotely comparable with Iran. Both were taken by Israel safe in the judgment that any reaction to their attack would be containable both politically and militarily. Both actions were taken when Turkey was still Israel’s strategic ally. And that is no longer the case.
Let us assume, however, that the recent IAEA report is broadly accurate and that Iran is intent on acquiring nuclear weapons. It is undoubtedly true that if President Ahmadinejad were to control a nuclear weapon, it would pose a serious threat to Israel. But remember this: Israel was not the reason Iran started to pursue a nuclear weapons programme. Key leaders in today’s Iranian opposition supported developing a nuclear deterrent when they were fighting off a pre-emptive Iraqi attack, which lasted for eight years in the 1980s.
The US military has “war-gamed” an Israeli attack on Iran. The conclusion of these exercises is that even attacks that don’t involve flying over Iraq lead inexorably, within a few days, to the involvement of US forces in the air and at sea against Iran to keep the Straits of Hormuz open. This was part of the reasoning behind President Bush’s decision to refuse point blank the Israeli request in 2008 to overfly Iraq and supply equipment to bomb Iran. Bush helpfully made this decision public before President Obama took office.
The UK is now seen as the hardliner on Iran and this gives us the opportunity to make our position clear, preferably publicly, that we do not intend to be sucked into overt military action against Iran by Israel. If the US president eventually were to decide to take pre-emptive military action against an Iranian nuclear weapons programme, that would be a serious option which any UK government would be bound to study with great care; but there should be no presumption that we would act jointly with the US. It will depend on many factors, not least what happens in the UN Security Council and the reaction of key Nato allies, in particular in this case, Turkey. We will also need to gauge the reaction of the elected Iraqi government.
A favourable negotiating opportunity with regards to Iran’s nuclear programme may present itself, particularly when Ahmadinejad’s presidency comes to an end. Until now, President Obama has wisely chosen a combination of dialogue, negotiation and sanctions with Iran. He has had some success with sanctions, mainly by resetting US relations with Russia. Meanwhile Iranian opposition leaders want the US, EU and the UN to be relentless against human rights abuses and to develop tougher but more selective sanctions.
Britain’s strategy must remain one of acting within the UN Security Council and of involving Russia and China in progressive sanctions to stop Iran proceeding to the stage of acquiring nuclear weapons. It is devilishly difficult to deliver, as it means accepting Iran’s right to develop a programme of civil nuclear-powered reactors to produce electricity while seeking to prevent, through tougher sanctions, the simultaneous development of a nuclear weapons programme. Yet this hard-nosed strategy is the one that the UK should not abandon now or in the immediate future.
The US military has “war-gamed” an Israeli attack on Iran. The conclusion of these exercises is that even attacks that don’t involve flying over Iraq lead inexorably, within a few days, to the involvement of US forces in the air and at sea against Iran to keep the Straits of Hormuz open. This was part of the reasoning behind President Bush’s decision to refuse point blank the Israeli request in 2008 to overfly Iraq and supply equipment to bomb Iran. Bush helpfully made this decision public before President Obama took office.
The UK is now seen as the hardliner on Iran and this gives us the opportunity to make our position clear, preferably publicly, that we do not intend to be sucked into overt military action against Iran by Israel. If the US president eventually were to decide to take pre-emptive military action against an Iranian nuclear weapons programme, that would be a serious option which any UK government would be bound to study with great care; but there should be no presumption that we would act jointly with the US. It will depend on many factors, not least what happens in the UN Security Council and the reaction of key Nato allies, in particular in this case, Turkey. We will also need to gauge the reaction of the elected Iraqi government.
A favourable negotiating opportunity with regards to Iran’s nuclear programme may present itself, particularly when Ahmadinejad’s presidency comes to an end. Until now, President Obama has wisely chosen a combination of dialogue, negotiation and sanctions with Iran. He has had some success with sanctions, mainly by resetting US relations with Russia. Meanwhile Iranian opposition leaders want the US, EU and the UN to be relentless against human rights abuses and to develop tougher but more selective sanctions.
Britain’s strategy must remain one of acting within the UN Security Council and of involving Russia and China in progressive sanctions to stop Iran proceeding to the stage of acquiring nuclear weapons. It is devilishly difficult to deliver, as it means accepting Iran’s right to develop a programme of civil nuclear-powered reactors to produce electricity while seeking to prevent, through tougher sanctions, the simultaneous development of a nuclear weapons programme. Yet this hard-nosed strategy is the one that the UK should not abandon now or in the immediate future.
