Nuclear Iran: Issue of the New Year

The most important issue of the New Year is likely to be the development of nuclear weapon capacity by Iran and how the West copes with it. Iran has been much in the news during the past decade for several reasons. They have supported insurgents in Afghanistan, Iraq, Palestine and elsewhere in the Middle East instead of using their oil wealth for the benefit of their own people. There has been cruel suppression of political opposition and enforcement of outdated Islamic laws. But much more alarming, there has been a strong belief in the West and fear in Israel that the country is building nuclear weapons while claiming to be developing nuclear power. A variety of sanctions have been imposed on Iran by the West with no material results.

The issue is complex and many faceted. The foremost consideration ought to be that several other nations in the area have nuclear weapons and nothing of any consequence has been done about it. Pakistan, an almost failed state which has been supporting Taliban not so secretly while taking billions in aid from the West, has had these weapons for decades. Their scientists are known to have sold nuclear secrets to other belligerent countries. Yet the U.S. and its allies have supported the regime throughout and no pressure has been put on successive military and civilian governments of that country to destroy nuclear weapons. Israel is known to have them too, but no one has mentioned any cuts in billions of dollars in aid annually, leave alone applying sanctions. North Korea has the weapons and freely brandishes them. There has never been any suggestion of ‘surgical strike’ on Pakistan or North Korea as there is in case of Iran.

While the fear of Iran in Israel is understandable, we in the West must appreciate the fear of Israel and its weapons in Iran? The U.N. Security Council has done nothing to understand these fears and to assuage them. If Iran’s march towards nuclear power status is to be contained it may be better to bring some balance in policies towards Iran, Israel and Arab countries. While guarantees for the safety of Israel are understandable, we do not have to help that country in oppression of Palestinians by looking the other way or finding lame excuses. While Israel has to be strong to defend itself it does not need to threaten its neighbours periodically. If the Middle East issues were resolved with fairness it would be possible to persuade Chinese or Russian to the Western viewpoint on Iran and achieve some progress.

This conflict has the potential of igniting a major confrontation between East and West which no one wants. Ten years of fighting in Afghanistan and Iraq has damaged the economy of the U.S. and Europe and the priority must be getting it back on growth track. The situation will be helped if the U.S. could persuade Israel to be less belligerent in its negotiations with Palestinians and give up its own nuclear arsenal. To expect Iran to submit to Western demands in current political environment is dreaming in Technicolor. Mullahs are religious fanatics and giving in under pressure from infidels is not their way. Another long war in the region or the nuclear annihilation of Iran are not the options which can be contemplated by any President or the Prime Minister. Negotiations between all parties are the only way out of the impasse. A conference of all countries in the Middle East and the members of the Security Council to discuss the denuclearisation of the whole region, not just Iran, is more likely to bring long lasting peace than sanctions and military threats to one belligerent state which itself has felt threatened by external forces since the current regime took power there three decades ago.