The irony is rich. By [...]]]>
The irony is rich. By association, the U.S. is on the wrong side of history in Bahrain and, more importantly, with Riyadh. Note the analysis that Askari posits: Saudi repression of the Shia in Bahrain is more about repression in its own Shia Eastern province (where there’s oil) than about the spectre of Iranian meddling. Indeed, the aggressive Saudi game plan legitimizes Iran’s regional hegemonic aspirations.
Iran has no choice but to stand up for Shia rights if it wants to play a regional role now and in the future. The Saudi misstep affords Iran the perfect invitation to take on such a role more overtly and with much more justification than in the past. What sense of justice could allow Saudi Arabia to enter into Bahrain with force, to kill peaceful Shia protestors and rob them of their basic human rights, but outlaw Iran coming to the defense of oppressed Shia?
This lays bare the depravity of the proposed Israeli-Saudi alliance nonsense – proffered by rightists in Israel and hardline neocons in the U.S. — which is bad for Israel and bad for the region. I understand Israel’s attraction to counter-revolutionary forces, inspired by vestiges of the notion that autocracies are actually stable and viable in the long term. And, of course, Saudi’s hostility toward Iran and indifference about the Palestinians must also be attractive. But it’s a Faustian bargain for a state which we are constantly reminded is the only liberal Western democracy in the region.
It also goes a long way toward showing that, if the people of Iran matter at all, the U.S. shouldn’t be giving a hoot what either the Israelis or the Saudis have to say about the Islamic Republic. Both U.S. allies have been exposed as caring little for democracy in the region. Perhaps, as Askari recommends, at this critical juncture in Middle Eastern history, the U.S. should be putting some pressure on Saudi Arabia itself.
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He writes (my emphasis):
Sanctions invariably fail to achieve their goal if the majority of citizens in the sanctioned country support the objectionable policy, in this case, Iran’s nuclear-enrichment program. I believe that the majority of Iranians support this policy because of Iran’s isolation during the Iran-Iraq War and the shameful use of Western-supplied chemical weapons on Iranians. Thus, the focus on Iran’s nuclear policy has been doomed from the start. But if the United States shifts its focus to the regime’s human-rights abuses, corruption and failure to deliver economic prosperity, then success becomes more likely. This shift in U.S. policy should be carefully considered because an agreement with an Iranian leadership that had the interests of its people at heart would be much more likely to be honored.
His proposal to gain Iranian popular support of a U.S.-instigated overthrow of the regime is difficult to follow (my emphasis again):
Success can be further enhanced by two additional measures. First, as the central bank of Iran has filled, in part, the void left by the exclusion of its commercial banks from international transactions, sanctioning the central bank would close an important loophole. Second, in view of the recent depreciation of the rial, the United States could adopt one or two simple measures to initiate a run on the currency that could bring Iranians from all walks of life onto the streets to oppose the regime as never before.
It’s possible that collapsing the rial and destroying ordinary Iranian’s savings could bring people to the streets. But it seems extremely short-sighted to assume the Iranian public will jump to bring down their government, given the decades of animus between the United States and Iran that dates to the 1953 overthrow of the democratically elected Mohammad Mossadeq.
In his review of two recent books on the coup, James North wrote on Mondoweiss about how economic warfare, starting in 1951, was used to undermine Mossadeq’s government.
North wrote:
Mossadeq’s government fell mainly because the British had imposed a worldwide boycott of Iranian oil starting back in 1951, and British warships blocked exports. Most of the third world was still under formal colonial rule then, so Iran had to stand alone. Economic warfare, not the cunning Kermit Roosevelt outfoxing flustered and foolish Iranians, was decisive.
So while it’s possible that a strategy of economic warfare that would wipe out the country’s banks and destroys the currency could bring the Iranian public around to the United State’s side. More likely, they have a greater sense of history than Askari gives credit, and would consider such a plan a disaster.
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