UNITED STATES: Bush binds EU into tougher Iran posture

Analysis

Several European envoys have passed through Washington in the past six months and strongly encouraged the administration to support their strategy of critical engagement with Tehran (see IRAN: US endorsement vital to EU nuclear deal efficacy - November 15, 2004). They asserted that Iran would not agree to halt their proliferation activities without a sense that doing so would help ease tensions with Washington. If the talks failed, they said, the fault would rest on the shoulders of the United States.

US officials countered with scepticism that the talks could work under any conditions. They remain convinced that Tehran would happily accept any concessions made by outsiders but would barely slow progress on its nuclear programme. They point out that the Iranians agreed to halt enrichment of uranium in October 2003, and then made virtually the same agreement in November 2004, all the while insisting that they would forever reserve their right to pursue enrichment activities.

Limited options. For all of the administration's hostility toward Iran, it has few tools at its disposal (see US/ISRAEL: Strike on Iran highly unlikely - October 4, 2004):

• Washington has operated sanctions against Iran for years, but with no trade left to sanction against, it is unclear how the United States might ratchet such efforts up.
• An overt military assault on the Iranian government is an unlikely eventuality, especially given the rather mixed results of the assault on Iraq (only about a third the size of Iran).
• There is increased speculation that the United States might pursue covert military action against Iranian nuclear targets. However, such a strike would depend on identifying with some precision the location of a dispersed target. Planners would have to guard against repercussions should it go wrong, as did the failed 1979 effort to free the embassy hostages. Moreover, such an attack would probably rally Iranians around their government rather than against it, delaying rather than hastening the advent of a more 'manageable' government in Tehran.

Attempting to precipitate the fall of the clerical leadership in Tehran is attractive for many in Washington, but it is unclear how it might be done (see US/IRAN: Al-Qaida claims could undermine relations - July 23, 2004). Indeed, reformist forces in the country are far weaker than they were after President Mohammed Khatami's presidential victory almost eight years ago. Moreover, for all of the dissatisfaction with the status quo, the present leaders have precluded any clear alternative to them from gaining much popular support.

Iranian presidential elections. In addition, now is not a good time for Washington to be seeking change in Iran, because of the country's forthcoming presidential elections on June 17 (see PROSPECTS 2005: Iran-US tensions could rise - December 29, 2004). Any deal that the Bush team might reach before then that could be disavowed by a future Iranian government. Assuming that Iran's new president will not take office until August (an inauspicious time to gather otherwise vacationing US and European officials), it is thus unlikely that there will be much movement in US policy until September at the earliest.

What the Bush administration has done, instead, is to use this interregnum to seek to get Europe on board with a firmer policy toward Tehran. In this, Washington is seeking to multilateralise its policy, gaining one of the few levers it can vis-a-vis the Iranians.

US goals. The US goal is to make largely symbolic concessions to the Iranians now in exchange for European promises to be tougher on Tehran in the future if the Iranians do not live up to their obligations. The situation is similar to that faced by the EU in 2001, when it believed that the formation of the Quartet meant that it could energise US activities on the Arab-Israeli front. In the event, the EU found that US policy had changed little, yet it felt precluded from acting alone.

US officials have secured an EU statement that Iran's failure to meet its obligations would merit a referral to the UN Security Council. That is unlikely to be the only punishment that the administration wants, partly because of its lack of confidence in the Security Council as a venue, and partly because of the difficulty of winning Russian and Chinese agreement for punitive action against Iran. Thus, Europe will probably be asked to agree to a broad series of sanctions in the event of non-compliance. The EU has been resistant to such requests in the past, because of reservations about their utility, but in this case it may have little choice. Since it appears to have brought the United States 'alongside', and by extension, proved the relevance of the EU to diplomacy outside Europe, failing to reach agreement on terms would be a huge embarrassment.

Iranian policy. Iranian actions are unlikely to change much in the near term. The single unifying theme of the country's policy in recent years appears to be to avoid a major crisis in relations while refusing to take the necessary steps actually to improve them. In the coming months, modest inducements from the West, whether from Europe alone or an EU-US partnership, are unlikely to force a rethinking of that basic posture.

A key juncture will come this autumn, when Iran's new president decides whether he will make an effort to strike a 'grand bargain' with the West, or continue on the current policy path. When he is ready to investigate that prospect, Europe and the United States will be ready, too, and European policy is likely to be tied much closer to that advocated by Washington than the lines traditionally emanating from Brussels.