Not only for the US but also for the rest of the world, the coming crisis is likely to revolve around Iran’s nuclear armament program.

Quite often this writer feels uncomfortable when discussing radical Islam. One of the two major errors of his intellectual life is connected to this topic. Both cases are linked by a failure to recognize forces in their nascent state that, when matured, had a significant impact on shaping our time. The first one of these slip-ups dates back to 1958 when the Sino-Soviet split appeared. Its result put the USSR in an uncomfortable position. In 1972 Nixon and Kissinger exploited the quarrel to repair the Washington – Peking relationship. Thereby, in a world of three superpowers, the Soviet Union was left alone while confronted with two antagonists of the heavy-weight class. When the reversal of alliances began to unfold the author could not believe that China and the Soviets would separate.

The other, and today more relevant error, dates back to the late 1970s when a colleague opined that the challenge of the future would not be Moscow but “radical Islam.” Most of the time our selective memory improves our past stance by correcting it to conform to today’s knowledge. In this instance, however, it is painfully recalled how the thesis was belittled by your correspondent as being an unwarranted extrapolation of the insignificant.

The failures sketched demonstrate that it is much easier to predict the past than to forecast the future. The former helps us to wash our hands retroactively to impress those who do not remember. Guessing the future is something that we are constantly forced to engage in regardless of the likelihood of failure. A French proverb puts it succinctly: “governing means foreseeing.” Everything we do involves guessing from what we know today regarding the future our action might mold. The purpose here is to present such a conjecture we must make in the light of the facts now available.

Not only for the US but also for the rest of the world, the coming crisis is likely to revolve around Iran’s nuclear armament program. This assertion is not based primarily upon the weighty issue of nuclear proliferation as such. Iran is on its way to becoming a major global issue, in which nuclear capacity only plays the role of the context. In this context, other factors, individually and also through their configuration, attain a truly threatening character.

There is a consensus in the world community regarding the salient facts pertaining to Iran. Accordingly, Iran has now, or will very soon attain, the ability to produce nuclear weapons. Supplying her with the nuclear technology she has a shortage of will determine the time and the extent of Iran’s weaponized nuclear prowess. This far nearly everybody is in agreement. That means there is a common denominator among governments which have divergent policies toward Iran and her nuclear striving. This includes Israel which, on the basis of Iran’s stated intention to erase it, appears determined to save itself even if it means resorting to a preventive nuclear attack. The USA’s position, with “all means being on the table,” shares to some extent Israel’s view of the threat and seems committed to preventing Iran from achieving full nuclear capability. On account of her mistrust of negotiations to buy off Iran, perhaps because being wary of European negotiators, possibly to exploit a good cop – bad cop act, initially Washington refused to participate in Europe’s offer of rewards for Iran’s canceling her nuclear adventure.

Europe occupies the next position on the scale. Officially, Europe is also convinced of the need to prevent the nuclear threat from materializing. Regarding the means, the Europeans are betting on the diplomatic approach. Their hope is that direct negotiations will ultimately convince the Mullahs to accept a deal of desisting in exchange for economic and political perks. Failing at this, the Continentals are willing to “escalate” by taking the matter before the Security Council. There a Russian-Chinese veto is likely to block the imposition of sanctions. At that juncture a flaw in Europe’s crisis management emerges. It is that they can be suspected of not really minding blockage, as that could be construed to have removed the possibility of acting “legally” with UN approval. The weakness of Europe’s policy continues even if UN sanctions are imposed. Regardless of the assumed nuclear threat, the French-German-British troika is unlikely to have a meaningful policy in the likely case that Iran ignores the measures. What happens if Iran continues to pursue nuclear armaments with the help of suppliers such as Russia? The logical next step would be the dissuasion of Iran by other than diplomatic-economic means. As things stand, applying an open-ended assortment of instruments to deter Iran is unlikely. Knowing this is likely to harden Tehran’s negotiating position. At any rate, regarding the talks it is not ascertainable whether Iran is holding out for a better deal or whether what she really wants is not diplomatic results but more time to complete her weapons-project. Naturally, that achievement would mean that thereafter the Ayatollahs could negotiate with the Bomb.

Lastly — since countries uninterested in anything but immediate calamities are not worth discussing — there is Russia. Officially Russia is also against Iran going from a potential to an actual nuclear power. She does not dispute that Iran could achieve nuclear status. Russia’s view is that her deliveries of critical building blocks for Iran’s nuclear industry present no danger as an agreement assures that Iran does not use such deliveries to build the Bomb. Apparently Moscow’s view of Iran’s trustworthiness is not influenced by a shining record of repeated violations of agreements in this area.

To sum up, there is widespread agreement that Iran can become a nuclear power and that she might want to take this step, which is regarded as undesirable by most countries. The areas of disagreement concern the timing of the threat and especially the means that are best suited to deal with it.

If you went along with this presentation you might find yourself in an uncomfortable situation. In case you oppose the US’ involvement in Iraq then your positions are not consistent with each other. Just eliminate a few words in the foregoing and replace them with phrases appropriate to Iraq. What you get is a sketch that could have been penned before that conflict. Any further plea about this appears superfluous.

From the foregoing it becomes apparent that Iran and some major global players are on a collision course. It seems that any political solution that rests on verified facts is better than the best of the military options. This makes diplomacy, if it leads to an agreement with verification written into it, the optimal resolution of the crisis.

For some time Europe has bemoaned that its efforts are undermined by the distance the USA keeps from their negotiations. As a result of the recent Rice-Bush forays into Europe, Washington has finally made these supportive gestures. Essentially America promised to complete Europe’s offerings with concessions of her own. More important than the content of these rewards was that, by implication, Iran’s deal with Europe would include the USA as a silent partner. By opening the door, further bilateral accords promised to lead to a normalization of value to both parties.

The total picture suggests that global politics might be approaching an impasse in the matter of Iran’s nuclear project. European diplomacy is unlikely to achieve in exchange for economic incentives iron clad guarantees with the unlimited right to control Iran’s compliance. At the same time, Europe is unwilling to do more than to talk. Russia will continue to sell Iran whatever it can pay for — while Europe exports dual use technology to Peking. Even UN sanctions will hardly change this. Nor will the concern Russia should have about WMDs getting into the hands of her own terrorists dissuade her. Meanwhile, for Israel, and to a lesser extent the US, the situation as it is cannot be allowed to continue forever. All this translates into an impasse and points to a limited time-frame during which it can be allowed to persist.

While the unconditional peaceniks will not like it, there is a knot that cannot be tolerated, and the cutting or tightening of this Gordian knot is in Iran’s hands. Whether the window of opportunity left for talks will bear fruit depends on the Mullahs’ bargaining objectives. Are they upping the ante to get the best deal? While they could miscalculate on the basis of their opponents’ earlier softness, this is our best case scenario. How bad this “best” really is becomes clear if we consider the bad example being created. Iran would in essence be rewarded for making a credible threat and then dropping it once ransom is paid. The long term consequences promise to bring numerous vicissitudes. Another possibility is that Iran is using diplomacy as a weapon. Her motive for the talks might not be to secure her interests by embedding them into an agreement. Much rather the goal of the talks could be to gain time until a military position is attained that makes further political diplomacy secondary.

Whatever the tactic and the strategy might be, the news as this essay is being concluded is disturbing. Surprisingly, Iran reacted through its Chief Spy to the US’ offer negatively. Teheran called the bid lacking in “respect” and stated that the US should “apologize” for the insult. Here one should be reminded that till now it was Iran’s demand that the Europeans bring America’s consent into the negotiations. It could be that this was posturing in order to get more. Transatlantic tensions being no secret, declaring the talks in trouble could be expected to bolster Europe’s inclination to put pressure on the USA. However, what happens if one believes what the Mullahs say and do? In that case this appears to be a further indication that what they want are negotiations to gain time, and that they do not seek a political agreement as that might hinder the military foreign policy scheduled for later. Therefore, it seems that, so as to keep the disagreement within the boundaries of the political-diplomatic realm, the Europeans will have to speak with undiplomatic clarity to the Iranians across the green table. It is a good question whether they will be heard and believed.