Many observers - this one included - believe that President Reagan's concern for the American hostages in Lebanon was the true reason he decided to send arms to Iran. His explanation about seeking to gain influence in post-Khomeini Iran has the ring of an after-the-fact rationalization.
But if the president thought mainly about hostages, most of his aides did genuinely concentrate on building ties to Iran. This should not come as a surprise, for policy specialists have long argued that the United States cannot afford to be cut off from Iran. Iran's critical location next to the U.S.S.R., Afghanistan, and the Persian Gulf, they point out, makes reasonable relations between the U.S. and Iran imperative. Anger stirred up by the seizure of the American embassy seven years ago, they argue, must not permanently derail relations between the two countries.
This is the geo-political school; keep your eye on harbors and battalions, don't waste your time worrying about ideology. Geo-strategists point to common concerns of the U.S. and Iran: the Soviet menace, stability in the Persian Gulf, and opposition to a Soviet-dominated Afghanistan. To prepare for Khomeini's death, they say, Washington should do everything possible to gain a foothold in Iran.
Although not widely accepted by the general population, this approach to Iran has become nearly universal in sophisticated circles. The cognoscenti acclaim recent attempts to re-establish relations with Iran, though they condemn the faulty efforts of the MacFarlane-Poindexter-North team.
Judging by his book, Revolutionary Iran, Rouhollah K. Ramazani shares this view. Ramazani, the Harry Flood Byrd Jr. professor of Government and Foreign Affairs at the University of Virginia and a noted scholar of Iran's external relations, believes strongly in the need for a diplomatic opening to Iran. His book offers the fullest exposition of the soft approach to Iran; in light of recent developments, it therefore deserves careful scrutiny.
The key question is: how compelling are his arguments? To be sure, the abstract notion of improving relations with Iran is attractive, but are arms deliveries the way to do it? Looking at other cases demonstrates the incongruity of this method: when Brezhnev, Andropov, and Chernenko were ailing, should the U.S. have sold weapons to promote the "moderates" in the Soviet succession struggle? With Hafez al-Assad sick, should Israel sell arms to Syria to strengthen the "moderates" in Damascus? It is puzzling why a strategy that makes no sense elsewhere should work in Iran.
I expected to Ramazani to make a tough argument based on geo-politics. And while he does emphasize that "passion is not policy" and he does argue that the U.S. and Iran share interests, his approach is actually premised on something very different - a roseate view of the ayatollahs' foreign policy. Against all odds, Ramazani holds the international role of Iran to be pragmatic, even helpful to the United States. To reach this conclusion, however, he makes free with the facts. A few examples:
Ramazani doubts that Iran has a role supporting terrorism. He dismisses accusations about "alleged" Iranian support for terrorist groups on the grounds that they are "overwhelmingly based on circumstantial evidence." He insists that "the Western case against Iran is based on conjecture more than on hard evidence." In fact, there is plentiful hard evidence, about which Ramazani seems not to know. For example, no where does he mention in the matter of the bombing of the U.S. embassy in Kuwait in December 1983 that one of the suicide bombers' fingertips was found in the embassy wreckage. This became, in The Washington Post's description, "the Rosetta stone" for understanding Iranian-sponsored terrorism. The finger belonged to Ra'd Maftal Ajil, a man who had entered Kuwait on an Iranian passport and who undertook the bombing attack on the orders of a courier from Iran. His identity led the authorities to a whole network of Iranian-sponsored terrorist groups. This evidence is much more than "conjecture."
Take an even clearer example: Iranian agents hijacked a Kuwaiti airliner in December 1984, killed two of the American passengers on board, and commandeered the plane to Tehran. After the Iranian authorities went through the charade of storming the plane - an act that Ramazani takes at face value - they declared the hijackers to be criminals and liable to Iranian laws. Of course, the hijackers were never brought to trial but disappeared from view, presumably to engage in more acts of terror.
"There are definite signs that Iran is trying to distance itself from terrorist groups." Implicit to the word "trying" in this sentence is the notion that the terrorist groups have thrust themselves on a reluctant Tehran. All the information that has come out about Khomeini government efforts to organize its followers for terrorist activities contradicts this assertion. It has even developed a new and especially effective form of terrorism, the suicide squad. Also, the "definite signs" Ramazani finds for a reduction in support for terrorism are illusory: most recently, on Christmas day, Iranian agents hijacked an Iraqi civil airliner, killing more than sixty people.
Ramazani dismisses Tehran's massive efforts to overthrow foreign regimes by blaming the victim: "The Iranian appeal," he writes, "feeds on indigenous frustrations. . . . Iran's strength is derived from the sociopolitical fragility of its neighbors." By extension, Afghanistan's "sociopolitical fragility" should be held responsible for the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan.
A benign view of Iranian foreign policy as a whole emerges from Revolutionary Iran: "This book has revealed that with respect to every major issue, including the war with Iraq, Iranian policy has consistently contained elements of self-restraint, pragmatism, and even, occasionally, helpfulness." These calming words deceive. The author ignores innumerable incidents of terror and sabotage, four and a half years of aggressive war against Iraq, and probably the most pervasive and virulent anti-American campaign ever launched.
This analysis of Iran leads to equally mistaken policy advice. Two points stand out. First, Ramazani holds French amorality up as a model and suggests that "the United States might do well to borrow a page from French diplomacy." As an example, Ramazani cites the French switch from Iraq in 1983 to Iran in 1986: "I believe the French government made the strategic judgment that Iraq's ability to stay in the war was eroding, and acted accordingly." Ramazani also wants Washington to be "building bridges" to Syria, another enemy, while pulling away from Israel. The lesson is clear: disregard your beliefs, your security interests, and your friends, just make sure you judge the odds correctly and bet on the winning side.
Second, he considers the American desire to preserve the status quo vis-vis the Soviet Union "outmoded" and advocates encouragement of "basic changes in practice." This sounds like an endorsement of the Islamic Republic of Iraq.
The broad outlines of Ramazani's advice can be summarized as follows: Appease your enemies, pick a winner, promote turmoil, and, regardless what evidence you have, never accuse Iran of supporting terrorism.
Ramazani's analysis is worth dissecting in some detail, for his ideas underlie much of the impetus for improved relations with Tehran. It is a faulty analysis based in equal parts on a misreading of Tehran's intentions and a cynical, short-sighted understanding of American interests. In short, Ramazani's book shows the mistaken presumptions behind the tilt toward Iran.
Granting the importance of Iran, is there another, non-appeasing policy for the U.S. to adopt? There is: it relies not on sweetness and good will but on strength. The most direct and useful way to enhance U.S. influence vis-à-vis Iran is to help Iran's foremost enemy, Iraq. The supply of economic aid, arms, and intelligence to Iraq will make the Iranians sit up and take notice of American wishes; it also has the additional benefit of blunting Iran's chances to defeat Iraq and thereby disrupt the entire Middle East.
The Reagan Administration should find this strategy a natural fit. Just as a military buildup had to precede improved relations with the U.S.S.R., so must American leverage precede improved ties with Iran. Helping Iraq is the Strategic Defense Initiative of relations with Iran - the best way to make an enemy less aggressive and less dangerous. The Reagan Administration knows about S.D.I. but not about help to Iraq; perhaps reading Rouhollah Ramazani's unconvincing argument will help point it in the right direction.
