Iran is neither a new problem nor just a problem of nuclear weapons proliferation. Both before the Shah and after, Iran’s strategic role in the Persian Gulf and Middle East has properly made it an ongoing preoccupation of the United States. Our military victory in Iraq does nothing to change this reality.  But that same victory has importantly affected the stakes, leverage, and concerns of both the United States and Iran.  Simply put, the war in Iraq should change the way we think about Iran, and should change the way in which Iran thinks about us.

We have continuing concerns about the current Iranian regime, its evident pursuit of nuclear weapons and ballistic missile capabilities, its active support for the terrorist opponents of a Mideast peace, and its militant theocratic ideology that is so hostile to the United States.  What is new, albeit unsurprising, is that Iran very likely will play a central role – for good or ill – in determining whether we are able to “win the peace” in Iraq, or whether our military victory proves to be pyrrhic.

For reasons that stand at the intersection of politics and religion, the Iranians are a force to be reckoned with.  The Shia religious leaders in Iran are that country’s ultimate political authority.  But the Shia holy places are in Iraq.  Geopolitics aside, that fact alone gives the Iranian clerics – and therefore the Iranian government – an immense stake in the shape of a postwar Iraq, and in the leadership of the Shiite community in its neighbor.

The Shia constitute the largest ethnic/religious community in Iraq, and Shia clerics are virtually certain to be a major political force in the post-Saddam period.  The religious leaders of the Shia community in Iraq are themselves split into factions, and are contesting for political and religious control.  But several have a great deal in common with their counterparts in Iran, and both can be expected to do whatever they can to ensure that those are the Shia leaders who emerge on top in Iraq. These religious, if not political, ties between the clerics in Iran and several of their co-religionists in Iraq suggest that US warnings to Tehran not to meddle in the political reconstruction of Iraq could be somewhere between futile and irrelevant. 

Indeed, the challenge we face in Iraq is not simply the familiar one of deterring a nation-state from acting in ways contrary to our interests. We also confront the challenge of trying to mitigate Iranian hostility, or the even more complicated and daunting task of insulating the majority community – and, very possibly, dominant political force – inside Iraq from the influence of their co-religionists in Iran.

There is an ongoing debate in Tehran that mirrors the debate in Washington about Iran.  We do not have good insight into the details of Iranian political dynamics.  But we do know that in the context of admittedly significant constraints, Iranian politics are dynamic, there are real struggles among distinct factions, and some of these factions have agendas that are more compatible with US interests – including with respect to post-Saddam Iraq – than are those of their domestic opponents.

We also do not know how Iraq has affected the internal debate, but is very likely that there has been an impact, and quite possible that the effect has been significant.  At a minimum, the war in Iraq has provided a vivid demonstration of US willingness and ability to use force to counter the threat posed by weapons of mass destruction and terrorism.  It also must have raised new doubts in Tehran about whether the United States can be successfully confronted or effectively counterbalanced.  Finally, it has transformed Iran’s strategic landscape, with substantial US forces now arrayed along Iran’s western border to complement the US military presence to the east in Afghanistan.  

In brief, chances are that Iraq has shuffled the political deck in Tehran, creating both the opportunity and the necessity of reviewing the bidding on US policy toward Iran.  But what to do?

Since none of the contending political factions in Iran is particularly attractive, it is tempting to shun them all, try instead to nurture the progressive societal and demographic forces at work in the country (e.g., by expressing support for the street demonstrations in Tehran), and just wait for these forces to triumph.  Such an approach, however, not only assumes that time and the tide of history are on our side, but also assumes that, in the interim, a policy of isolation and confrontation can effectively deal with Iranian threats to our objectives in Iraq and elsewhere.  Such a tacit policy of “regime change” also runs the risk of creating an unintended but powerful reaction that not only unifies the contending factions and stifles debate, but also stirs an intensified Iranian nationalism that slows and undermines the very forces on which we are pinning our hopes.

Given the stakes, risks, and uncertainties, we need better insight into how Iraq has affected politics and policy in Tehran.  One way to do so would be to resume the exchanges we had been having with the Iranians in Geneva, but have now suspended.  These talks have been held under UN auspices, and have been focused on practical issues arising from the war in Afghanistan and, most recently, Iraq.  We should be open to expanding the agenda to address other issues and concerns, and should be willing to engage in a bilateral dialogue as well as in UN-sponsored meetings.  We also should be willing to explore hints from some Iranian officials that were the US to agree to such direct exchanges, “everything” would be on the table. 

An immediate payoff could be to constrain Iranian mischief-making in Iraq. The larger purpose would be to ensure that the Iranians understand that the threats they believe we pose to their security and regime survival stem directly from their pursuit of WMD, support for terrorist opponents of Mideast peace, and now, their potential challenge to our objectives for post-Saddam Iraq.  In doing so, we can test whether, in fact, “everything is on the table,” by making clear that as they reduce – or increase – the threats they pose to our interests, we will reciprocate.  Put differently, we can try to convince them that our problem with Iran is with what they are doing, not with who they are.

There are no guarantees that such an approach would be successful.  On the contrary, the uncertainties and unknowns described above suggest that we cannot be confident about any predictions.  But it would be a low risk way of clarifying intentions and reducing the risks of miscalculation, while leaving the door open and building international support for tougher measures should those prove necessary.

 

Arnold Kanter, a senior fellow at the Forum for International Policy, served as Under Secretary of State from 1991-1993.