I have recently returned from a tour of the Islamic Republic of Iran. I had a remarkable, exciting and eye opening experience. But more interesting, surprising, even shocking, was that the Iranian people I met, also surprised and shocked to see an American, were very happy for my being there. It seemed quite genuine, and the impression was widespread, virtually universal. “Thank you for being here, thank you for coming. We know that your press has nothing but bad things to say about us. Thank you for taking the chance on us. Thank you for coming to Iran.” Such a response would be predictable if it were only coming from hotel and restaurant staff, those who needed the most, lacking business from the sanctions. It is not predictable when it comes as a consistent message from people on the street.
Welcome scenes in Iran
One little boy was typical. He asked where I was from, and when I told him he said, “I love New York”, and opened his jacket to show me his New York tee shirt. I opened my jacket to show him mine. “America is beautiful. Thank you for coming to Iran”. I can remember warm welcoming people all over the world, but none more welcoming than the Iranians. I told one young man that I would bring the message home to my friends that Iran is a lovely place to visit, and he said, “Please, write to Mr. President Trump, tell him we are nice people”.
Iranian school children visiting a famous Mosque
Of course, even Secretary of State Mike Pompeo says that we have no argument with the people, only the government. Here our Secretary echoes another frequent theme I heard from many many people who, when they found I was American and enjoying the time, said “Governments can be enemies but people like each other.” So, if a visit to Iran was one of the most interesting, exciting and pleasant vacations I have ever had, and it was, and if the people are among the most warm and welcoming people I have met, and they were, then perhaps it might be reasonable, as an American, to try to take a fresher look at the whole relationship between our two countries. I had previously in these pages written in support of our government approving the nuclear deal with Iran, but that was more out of my overall support for diplomacy, and my belief that a stable and verifiable nuclear agreement was in our nation’s best long term strategic interests. I still believe that, but now I wish to try to determine whether one person’s pleasure in visiting Iran can be reconciled with so many decades of distrust and antipathy at the level of our two governments.
Twenty years ago the then Secretary of State, Madeline Albright, argued that reformist currents in the then newly elected Iranian government should be welcomed. While announcing a modification in a sanctions program which had been directed against the country, she called Iran “one of the world’s oldest continuing civilizations and one of the globe’s richest and most diverse cultures” and said she hoped that “both in Iran and the United States, we can plant the seeds for a new and better relationship in years to come”. She referred to a strong “common ground between our two peoples”, saying “both are idealistic, proud, family-oriented, spiritually aware, and “ – perhaps most importantly for the understanding of some Iranian rhetoric – “fiercely opposed to foreign domination”.
Another foreign policy expert on Iran observes that “with a disproportionately young and well-educated population, situated at the wellspring of the world’s petroleum supplies and at the crossroads of Asia’s emerging democracies, Iran is uniquely positioned to enhance the interest of the United States and its allies in a peaceful and economically vibrant future -or, alternatively, to sow greater chaos and instability”. My visit and my conclusions must be timely, as this same very week I publish this, the same foreign policy expert on Iran is also asking that our relationship be reconsidered.
This is not just the the naive plea that we all get along. Before reviewing what I will call a historical balance of grievances, it is important to note that this is not just a plea to revisit the past, but to look toward a possible and mutually beneficial future. There is much opportunity for our own nation as well as a stable order for us to effect a repair of our relationship. Consider the possibilities going forward. Iran is mostly a desert land just waiting to be developed, roads to be built, cities and towns to grow.
Someone is going to partner with Iran to do those things. Iran is at one major hub of exchange from East to West, from North to South, one of the central nodes of the ancient and enduring “Silk Road”. Iran has always been part of the commercial traffic of civilization. One has to wonder if it is our own best interests to continue to attempt to isolate them, and thereby ultimately isolate ourselves from this hub.
Iran has prided itself on its previous good connections with the rest of the world. We were taken to a palace where gifts from other countries to prior governments are displayed. The plates below are from China and Japan. The table, we were proudly told, was a gift from Napoleon.
Not everyone is avoiding engagement with Iran. Russia has not held off in taking economic advantage of the opportunities. The Wall Street Journal has in fact called Russia the winner in our return to the sanctions regime.
Russia and Iran shake hands. Image from Breitbart. 
China has pumped vast sums into the Iranian economy as Western interests have retreated, or suspended their advance in the face of US renewed sanctions and withdrawal from its international agreements.
China and Iran are not avoiding each other
China’s new Silk Road goes right through Tehran
China will likely become a major consumer of Iranian Oil, sanctions non-withstanding, and Iran provides an important ‘linchpin’ in China’s Belt and Road Initiative, its reframing of the classic Silk Road. Iran is increasingly “having to rely on China to offset the Western-induced isolation, predominately championed by the United States”. Chinese care makers are prepared to fill the gap “left by French automakers who closed their Iranian operations” due to US sanctions. I would ask the question whether it is in the best interests of the United States to allow such focused and strategic investment in time and relationship by Russia and by China with Iran go unanswered?
The damage, from President Trumps withdrawal from the agreement, to the perceived value of America’s word, the validity of its signature on an international agreement are naturally painful, disappointing and embarrassing to me as an American, but not really the point I am trying to make. The point is that in weighing the balance of grievances. With the USA unilaterally withdrawing from an agreement which we ourselves forced on Iran, and which was approved by almost every other major world power, and which was approved by both our Senate and the United Nations, it is difficult to avoid the conclusion that the balance of grievance has shifted, vis a vis the United States, in favor of Iran.
There is one important but subtle point, and one not always appreciated point regarding the effects to us of our withdrawal. Benjamin Becker, a close friend from Germany with some experience in things economic, made the following additional and very relevant observations regarding the long term effects, detrimental to ourselves, that the withdrawal from the agreement and the reimposition of sanctions is likely to have:
“The renewed sanctions are doing lasting harm, harm that will continue to be felt even if future U.S. administrations are wiser than the current one and return to the nuclear agreement. That has to do with path dependencies in international trade that span years and decades. Germany discovered that after the sanctions ended following the nuclear agreement. At the time we thought that our exporting industries would face fantastic prospects in Iran. After all, Iran pre-sanctions had been a reliant importer of German goods and products. In reality, exports remained far behind expectations. The reason was that in the meantime, China had pretty much filled the gap, and re-taking market share against them proved an almost impossible task. It makes sense when you think about it – one purchase decision can influence a multitude of follow-up decisions which favor the company or country you first did business with. Whether it’s compatibility, industrial standards, replacements, service deals, interpersonal connection, trust, name recognition – once trading and consumption patterns are established, they’re extremely hard to break up, and even more so if you face a formidable competitor like China who itself keeps on innovating. So when we allow ourselves the luxury of suspending trade for a few years at the whim of a certain president, we don’t only lose these few years, we lose so much more for such a long time to come – and many opportunities for business, trade, and by extension opportunities for peaceful interaction as well as cultural and political influence, may be lost forever. That makes re-establishing peaceful relations with Iran an even more pressing task than it already is.”
So, having proposed the benefits of renewed relationship, we need to clear the air, or try to, of what has clouded and destroyed what was once a good connection. In what follows I wish to construct a ‘balance sheet of grievances’ between our two countries.
It is not hard for those who remember the transition from the days before the revolution in Iran, who remember the days of the Shah, to trace back the antipathy which grew and continued. While in the USA it is taken as axiomatic that the Iranian government are the aggressors and our intractable adversaries, I have come to believe that a balanced assessment of the grievances each side has against the other may make room for another, more even handed view. A view which will allow some progress forward out of what has become, especially over the last year, an unnecessarily adverse situation. True, Iran and the USA have a number of serious grievances, each against the other. I will try to look at each grievance as fairly as I can. As a guide for this, I have presented below a table of US grievances against Iran, and Iranian grievances against the United States. In what follows we can look at some merits to each’s claim against the other.
A caveat is in order. There are many people, patriots, so called, who feel that any recognition of fault in our own country is unseemly. Any such inquiry constitutes an “apology”. It compromises our ‘exceptionalism’ to admit fault. If one starts a conversation about our relations with other countries by admitting error or fault, one is automatically not to be listened to. President Obama was accused of having an “apology tour” when he sought to place world events in a reasonable and balanced manner. One could consider the relationship between the USA and Iran with some openness to the complaints of each. However if the reader is already of the opinion that any recognition of fault on the part of the US, or that any moral comparison is heresy, then perhaps that person will remain unconvinced by my arguments. It is not my intention in this essay to ‘apologize’ for the United States, but rather to place the grievances which the US and Iran hold against each other in such a context as to consider whether maybe it is time for each of us to stop demonizing the other, and move on towards an eventual rapprochement, or reconciliation. Consider, then, the table, and the arguments which follow.
The Embassy takeover. Americans have for four decades viewed Iran primarily through the lens of the US Embassy takeover in 1979. I do not in any way wish to whitewash that attack, or to pretend that it was acceptable. The armed assault on any nation’s embassy is an act of war and a violation of the most basic of those international norms without which we cannot have an orderly connection between nations. An embassy is the symbol of diplomacy and without diplomacy there is war. Had President Carter at that time opted for a military option I could have supported it. I still think it might have been a justified, if not necessarily optimally prudent response. One cannot pretend that the armed take over of the American Embassy was Iran’s finest hour.
Still, it might be helpful in going forward to try to frame that event, as reprehensible as it was, within the context of the the history of modern American – Iranian relationships. If not to condone, it would be fair to try to understand the event through the eyes of the other. One aspect is that the embassy takeover, and the Ayatollah’s reaction to it were part of an internal power struggle, but that would offer no excuse. There is another aspect to be considered.
Iran claimed at the time, and still does, that the Embassy was not acting in good faith as a diplomatic outpost. They assert that it was rather a center of espionage designed to subvert the establishment of the new government. They still keep the former Embassy site open as a museum. They call it a “Den of Spies”. They insist that the people who worked there, and the purpose they served was not one of genuine diplomacy, but that it was espionage. If, the Iranian argument goes, the embassy staff were not diplomats but rather spies, then detaining them would have different significance within international norms than the detention of diplomats. To weigh whether that assertion should have any impact on our lingering antipathy requires that we ask whether there is any reasonable basis for this accusation that the embassy was a center of intelligence gathering rather than the more universally accepted purpose of an embassy.
I did not visit the museum when I was in Tehran. Ours was a cultural tour, mostly ancient archeologic sites.
The tomb of Cyrus the Great, with Iranian tourists. 
Ancient Fortress
Ancient Persian Bust in Tehran Museum, dating from third millennium BC
But others have visited the site, and some Western observers have listed, for example, the existence of “soundproof dens, spying equipment and machinery and pieced together shredded documents.” Certainly the Iranian students were able to piece together shredded documents which suggested some CIA attempts to make contact with non-government Iranians during the period immediately after the revolution. In fact, some documentary support exists for a CIA attempt to recruit and pay a leading figure in the Iranian post-revolutionary government.
There may be no “smoking gun” to demonstrate that in 1979 the American Embassy existed primarily as an intelligence gathering outpost. One does wonder, however. A balanced view would have to admit that Iran might have cause for concern over the intelligence operations of the Embassy, even if not sufficient evidence to have justified occupation.
Why should Iran be so specifically concerned to see CIA covert influence as a threat to its vital interests. After all, we suspect that all embassies have some intelligence gathering role. Why the big deal? Here the Iranian grievance has some precedent to consider.
Elements of Iranian historical architecture
The CIA coup. In 1951 Iran elected a secular democrat, Mohammad Mosaddegh, as prime minister, a progressive who introduced a number of measures including land reform and social security. He was seen as a champion of anticolonialism, one who supported a modern democratic and freer Iran within the context of a constitutional monarchy. But he ran afoul of British and American sensibilities when he moved to nationalize Iran’s Oil industry. Britain had acquired all rights to Iranian oil reserves for less than a fifth of net profits, and even after several years of negotiations and ultimatums, new agreements gave less than a fifth of profits to Iran. Peter Frankopan, in his excellent The Silk Roads, reviews the post WWII situation in Iran very incisively, points out that the the Anglo-Iranian oil arrangement was “particularly odious”, “given the huge imbalance in the amounts paid to the British exchequer compared with royalties disbursed to Iran”. He goes on to paint a cogent picture of why Britain felt it so necessary, its empire crumbling, to elicit American help in counteracting the Iranian attempt to gain greater control of its resources.
The call for nationalization arose, as Mossadegh attempted to negotiate a complex settlement which was rejected by the British. The British then took a number of retaliatory countermeasures, including threats to other European companies for doing business in Iran, as well as intercepting ships carrying oil from Iran. At one point Mossadegh reached out to Washington for help in resolving the economic distress rendered by the boycotts, but was told he needed to settle with Britain.
The CIA’s participation in the coup which removed Mossadegh from power is not denied, however, the effectiveness of the CIA in its role in the coup has been questioned, and the significance of its role has also been disputed. The argument has been made that many parties were implicated in the removal of the legitimately elected Mossadegh from power. It has been argued that the Islamic Republic’s version of the story is an oversimplification. Calling it a legitimate leader being toppled exclusively by a malign CIA may ignore a more widely spread dissatisfaction with the direction that government was going. Nonetheless internal CIA documents revealed in 2013 are quoted as saying that the coup “was carried out under CIA direction as an act of US foreign policy, conceived and approved at the highest levels of government”.
It remains fair to agree on a very basic truth. Western interests, and specifically economic (what some might call ‘colonial’) interests threatened, American and British intelligence worked together to weaken, undermine and ultimately replace the legitimate leader minister of a Sovereign Iran with a government far more amenable to those western interests. If Iranians were overly concerned that in the 1979 takeover, the US embassy was being used to foment a similar weakening of the new Islamic Republic, then that position would be, if not necessarily accurate, then at least not without precedent. This does not justify the use of force to detain diplomats, but it puts the perception of diplomats as spies in a broader context. Western spies had, in fact, subverted the government before.
The 1953 coup, regardless of whether one sees it as CIA instituted or just CIA assisted brought back to direct control of the government the Shah of Iran. Where Mossadegh had been widely regarded as progressive, egalitarian, and committed to social justice, the regime of the Shah was characterized as one “which has created an atmosphere of fear…conveying a picture of extreme political repression”. While the early days after the revolution saw trials and executions by the Islamic Republic, “…the great majority of those who were tried and executed ( that is, in many cases, members of the Shah’s army and secret police) were charged with terrible violations of the most elemental human rights; and the testimony of the accused, so rich in detail and so internally consistent as to be credible tends to confirm the worse charges against the Shah’s regime”. Estimates for the number of deaths the Shah’s regime was responsible for and accusations vary, of course. It appears that the Ayatollah’s original revolutionary accusation that the Shah had murdered 60,000 is exaggerated perhaps 10 fold. But it is clear that thousands, though probably not tens of thousands died under the Shah’s rule from imprisonment, torture and use of deadly force against protest. Many of us may remember (if we remember college in the seventies!) that our campuses were replete with Iranian students carrying pictures of prisoners tortured by SAVAK.
Mike Pompeo, Secretary of State, has stated in a recent op.ed piece that the current regime of the Islamic Republic of Iran was responsible for thousands of deaths. And, to be fair, regarding deaths attributed to the Shah, perhaps a similar number were killed in similar manner during the first three years after the revolution. Iran did not greet the Shah’s secret police with “truth and reconciliation” committees. Things have changed from those days. When I was in Iran I heard talk of things having been “terrible” during the early days of the revolution, but better now. I was told that for the most part people were now free to do and say as they pleased – although perhaps, in a somewhat lowered voice, and some of it only in their own home or private place. According to some modern Iranian scholars “notions of democracy and human rights have taken root among the Iranian people”, and “Liberal notions of human rights are almost hegemonic in Iran today”. This corresponds to my experience in Iran, that people seemed to feel that, while the government had done many good things, no one thought it was perfect – nor did they seem at all afraid to say so. I did not in the least have the feeling, which I had expected to have, that people thought they could be tortured for saying the wrong thing. Perhaps they can be, but the sense of an “atmosphere of fear” which is reported to have existed under the Shah, was not, at least to my admittedly limited excursion, palpable.
The fact that Secretary Pompeo, use his defense of the US Saudi partnership to accuse Iran of being responsible for “thousands of American deaths”, is ironic, considering the literature regarding the role of Saudis, such as Osama bin Laden, in the 911 attack. As far as Irans attacks on US live, he is not only grossly exaggerating the figures but neglecting to mention that Americans killed by Iranian combatants were, for the most part, soldiers in Iraq, a country which we attacked with, at best, very minimal if any provocation. If Iran, bordering Iraq, had sent aid to protect Shia Militias from an invading army, it is not really, in my mind, quite fair to be condemning them as if they had murdered Americans without provocation. Al-Quida is not Iran. ISIS is not Iran. How that argument sits might depend on the readers view of the legitimacy of the Iraq War. A similar question will be asked, further in this discussion, regarding the legitimacy of a target when we discuss the Marine Barracks destruction in Lebanon. For the present, I have yet to see evidence of Iran involved in ‘thousands of American deaths.’
Before continuing to get too far ‘into the weeds’ let me frame again where I am going with this. Our national antipathy towards Iran takes as a given, as a bedrock principle, that Iran has been a ‘bad actor’ towards our nation and our allies. The main question in public discourse has never questioned this axiom, but always been how to deal with this misbehavior. I am attempting to examine whether the balance of grievances might not be more equal than we in the West have been lead to view. I will now move on to a prior Iraq war which has, I think, more significance in our understanding of the balance of grievances and the state of our current relationships.
The Iran Iraq War – The issue of Poison Gas. Many readers will not be old enough to remember the war between Iran and Iraq, which lasted from 1981 until 1989. Iraq, under Saddam Hussein, started that war with an unprovoked attack on Iran. This war may not be commonly remembered by the average American, so before examining whether Iran may have any grievance with us over Iraq’s conduct of that war, and whether the US could be said to have any role in it, it is useful to review the magnitude of the war, and what it might have meant to Iran.
The war between Iran and Iraq lasted one month shy of 8 years, or 95 months. By way of comparison, the involvement of the US in WWII lasted from Dec 7, 1941 through mid-September 1945, or 3 months less than 4 years. So the Iran – Iraq war lasted twice as long as the second world war did for us. Estimates vary, but it would appear that Iran lost upwards of 200,000 dead many times more injured. The population of Iran at that time was estimated to be about 40 million, so Iran lost 0.5% of its population. During the Second World War, the US lost about 400,000 out of a population of 138 million, or 0.3%. Therefore, both in terms of time at war, and percentage of the population lost, the Iran Iraq war had roughly twice the impact on Iran that the second world war had on the US. It was a BIG WAR, a big event, and every where we went, even tiny desert eco-camps there were prominently displayed posters of the war dead. They are called “the martyrs”. Pictures of young men who died in that war are literally everywhere you look, on buildings, along roads, in displays in airports.
Portraits of Iranian victims of the Iran-Iraq war, displays on buildings and in airports
Of course, that means nothing to our consideration of the balance of grievances if there is no US involvement or responsibility for the slaughter. No matter how bloody the slaughter, how could Iran hold a grievance if we had nothing to do with it? So, did we?
Peter Frankopan, in the comprehensive work The Silk Roads cited above, points out that while both the Ayatollah and the Prime Minister Badr of Iran stated at the time that they believed the US had engineered Iraq’s invasion, there is no hard evidence for that. There is, in fact, considerable evidence that Saddam Hussein devised the invasion on his own. However, the US, he points out, without officially claiming to be on one side, strongly supported Iraq, despite the fact that they had started the war with an unprovoked attack. He shows that after removing Iraq from the list of state sponsors of terrorism, the United States acted to help prop up the economy, allowed Saddam to buy “dual – use” technology, boost Iraqi oil exports, and impede sales of weapons and spare parts to Iran.
One might counter that the US in fact also helped Iran. Reagan’s “Iran-Contra” scandal involved selling anti tank missiles to Iran. However it is widely believed that this move was actually both to secure the release of American hostages and transferring funds to the rebels in Central America, rather than to help Iran. Kissinger is famously said to have observed that American interest in the war was that “both sides lose”, but the preponderance of evidence shows active US support for the aggressor, Iraq.
Our Iranian guide stated that no one had helped Iran during its war. (He either did not know, neglected or choose not to mention well documented Israeli arms sales to Iran from the outset.) However, he also mentioned that others had helped Iraq attack Iran with chemical weapons, with poison gas attacks. Daryoosh was polite enough and familiar enough with the customs of hospitality not to verbally implicate the US while I, his American guest was standing there, however there is a widely suspected belief that the United States facilitated, abetted or at least permitted Saddam Hussein to use chemical weapons against large numbers of Iranians. Can this accusation be verified, or is it anti-Western propaganda?
There exists substantial evidence that the US officials were very aware of and in fact facilitated Saddam’s use of poison gas against Iranian soldiers as early as 1983, and that it suppressed the evidence for this Iraqi violation of international law from public view. A Google search of the terms “evidence of US complicity in Iraqi gas attacks on Iran” yields 505,000 entries. It is not clear that the US directly supplied the chemical weaponry, but perhaps American companies supplied precursors. However, it is well documented that with full knowledge of Iraqi chemical capabilities and proclivities, the US provided Iraq with satellite photos of Iranian troop concentrations. What is also known is that the US did not condemn Iraq at the time for its use of chemical weapons, and prevented blame from being assessed to Iraq for these actions. Iraqi poison gas attacks are estimated to have caused 50 – 100,000 casualties.
I would submit that if we are really willing to weigh in a fair, impartial, just and moral manner, a ‘balance of grievance’, then the scales would include 52 hostages held 444 days and released unharmed on one side, but should also include complicity and facilitation of 50-100,000 poison gas casualties on the other.
The Beirut Marine Barracks bombing. In October of 1983 a suicide bomber using a truck bomb destroyed the barracks of the US Marines in Beirut, causing the largest single day casualties since the second world war.Although responsibility for the attack was claimed by a shadowy group calling themselves “Islamic Jihad”, much popular wisdom at the time and still today attributes the bombing to Iran. The suicide bomber was an Iranian national, and Iran was ultimately sued in US courts. When the government of Iran did not file a response the the claims, default verdicts were entered, over $2.5 billon dollars were awarded to the plaintiffs.
Iran has consistently denied involvement in the Marine Barracks attack. The US did not retaliate against Iran, and, most telling, Caspar Weinberger, then US Secretary of Defense stated that the reason there was no direct retaliation against Iran was that it was never really known if Iran was really responsible for the bombing. Finally, it needs to be remembered that the American Marines had strayed from what had initially been conceived of as a peace keeping mission. At the time of the attack the US had begun to take the role of an active participant in the civil war. The Marine commander noted at the time that Americans given up their neutrality in that conflict, and “were going to pay in blood for that decision”. We can call it terrorism, but I wonder if we really want to label with the pejorative “terrorism” every lethal attack on a military unit involved in combat. That might be a difficult precedent for our forces going forward to so define “terrorism”.
The Downing of the Civilian Jet-Liner.
In 1988 and Iranian commercial jet liner, Iran Air Flight 655 from Tehran to Dubai was shot down by an American missile fired form the Naval cruiser USS Vincennes. 290 people including 66 children were killed on the Airbus 300. The jet was hit while within Iranian airspace while on a routine flight path. The Vincennes, on the other hand, had entered Iranian territorial waters.
It was an accident. No American commander would ever shoot down a passenger jet intentionally. And this is not sarcastic, I believe it as one of my own bedrock beliefs. No American commander would ever shoot down a civilian jet intentionally. But that was not how it was seen by Iran. They noted that the commander had been involved in close calls with Iranian vessels before, and this incident was seen even by some American commanders as a result of the commanding officers known “aggressiveness”. Still, it was an accident. But the United States never formally apologized. 8 years later in settlement of a suit brought in international court the US paid $61.8 million dollars to the compensate the victims families, or approximately $213,000 per person. The average compensation to passenger families in airline deaths in 1988 was cited to be about $356,000 so this was somewhat low, but not out of the range of normal. (Although this is a little like ‘apples and oranges’ to compare an act of aggression which is suspected but not proven, with a clear accident, but it is interesting to note that the penalty applied by American courts for Iran’s supposed attack on the Marine Barracks, a combat force, was $ 2.6 Billion, fifty times per person the penalty assessed against the US for killing a larger number of civilians, albeit by accident.)
Perhaps an apology would have been appropriate. We generally apologize for simple mistakes. While then Vice President Bush’s statement one month later that he would never apologize for the United States, no matter what the facts were was said in a different context, it was seen by Iran as referring to this event. But, again, of course it was an accident. An interesting thought experiment – how gracious would we be if an Iranian warship operating in American territorial waters accidentally shot down an American civilian jet liner on its routine flight within the United States?
In any relationship between two nations in which there has been enmity, posturing, events and accusations and counter-accusations, it is difficult to equally weigh and assess blame. I would submit though that any assessment which tries to be even moderately fair and just, which weighs each grievance, weighs the embassy takeover, the CIA backed coup, chants of ‘Death to America” versus “axis of evil”, which includes US complicity in gas attacks, the accused Marine Barracks attack and civilian airliners, one would have to conclude that – in the battle of ‘good guy versus bad guy’, we are at the very best, “even-steven”. If you don’t believe that, then show me where Iran’s actual injury to the United States outweighs Western injury to Iran.
So, taking at least for, for the sake of argument, the assertion that Iran and the US are on a comparable moral high, or comparably low ground going into the nuclear negotiations of the last decade, let us proceed.
The Iran Nuclear Deal. Let us leave aside as too snarky the question of what business has the country which invented nuclear weapons and used them, together with the only country in the Middle East which (is rumored to) have them in demanding that a country which has pledged not to develop them stop even from producing nuclear fuel for peaceful purposes. For the present I will ‘stipulate’ that, perhaps, as one of the world’s only countries powerful enough to do so, we have the right and duty to prevent the proliferation of the weapons throughout a notoriously volatile region and one whose (relative) stability is of such importance to virtually every other nation.
Stipulating to that right and duty, that is exactly what our efforts accomplished. I have already argued this point in these pages. Pulling out from the deal, even though all observers agreed that Iran was complying with its requirements has had a large fall out.And could be “disastrous for the Middle East”, causing friction between the US and its allies, driving Iran nearer to Russia and China and perhaps permanently damaging US credibility as a negotiator or diplomatic partner. It has even been said that the partnership with America had a long and fruitful life — but Europe is ready to start over. Officials in the EU have asked: ‘With friends like Trump, who needs enemies?” In the words of one Rand Corporation researcher “The U.S. withdrawal was unnecessary and strategically harmful, and undermines both transatlantic trust and the ability of the U.S. to negotiate future multilateral agreements.”
The decision gave rise to general anger, even fury, leading Europeans to conclude that the US is no longer a country which “keeps its word and values its allies”. With this one action, America has, in the words of one commentator, “made a mockery of the value of its signature on an international agreement” Iran was understandably outraged. After all, Iran was universally found to be in compliance with the agreement.Even Secretary Pompeo testified that Iran was in compliance,and Secretary of Defense Mattis recommended preserving the agreement. Withdrawal has been clearly damaging to the Iranian economy and its prospects.While some have stated the effects will be minimal,there is a clear harm done, at least in exchange rates. My own experience was to arrive in Tehran the Saturday after the sanctions were reimposed on Monday, and I was able to exchange $100 for 150,000 Rial at an official exchange, an almost 2 fold collapse since prior to the reinstitution of sanctions. It was good for me, but it is not hard to understand Iranian anger.
The Islamic Republic of Iran and the Jewish State of Israel
There is one further, and perhaps most vexing issue. Iran’s continually expressed antipathy towards Israel, not just its policy but its legitimacy and right to existence, along with the allegations of antisemitism and, worse, Holocaust denial, should be concerning not only to Jews, to Jewish Americans, but to fair minded people everywhere. Certainly criticisms of the policies of nations is fair game for anyone, but the continued public, primary and often threatening stance toward Israel’s very existance is an issue I have had to try to confront, and anyone should address in seeking for a possible reconciliation with Iran. This was a particularly vexing issue for me, being Jewish, as shortly after my arrival home last month, I wanted to send warm and effusive greetings to my Iranian hosts, and was stopped in my tracks by fresh reports of the Iranian President calling Israel a “cancerous tumor”. Still I think it is possible to address, in some measure, these issues, and if not erase the concern, at least point out where another approach by both the USA and Israel could conceivably result in a different kind of relationship between the countries, albeit perhaps not soon or easily.
I would ask, for reflection, whether Israeli long run safety and security is enhanced more by Iran’s long term (and, if you really read the document, not certain sound bytes of it), permanent abandonment of nuclear arms exchanged for a re-integration into the world economic order, or by a very public abandonment of an international agreement, invoking broad and deep resentment, actively and publicly encouraged and facilitated by an Israeli leader.
The first question to begin this approach involves raw antisemitism, which is, unfortunately, not so rarely expressed anywhere anymore. However, as far as personal or individual antisemitism in Iran, although I wouldn’t have previously believed it possible, I attended Shabbat evening services in a Synagogue in Esfahan, Iran.
Shabbat Services in Esfahan, Iran
There are still 10-15,000 Jews in Iran, living generally comfortable middle class lives, free to stay or leave as they please. The president of Iran and its foreign minister have sent Rosh Hashanah greetings to the world’s Jews, and a poll commissioned by the Anti-Defamation league, no less, concluded that Iranians are the least antisemitic people in the Middle East and North Africa.
The current enmity between Iran and Israel did not always seem inevitable. Some have argued comparatively recently that reconciliation is not inconceivable even now. Our guide, perhaps because he knew I was Jewish, made a frequent mention of the collective memory that Cyrus the Great had freed the Jews, a source of pride in Iran. The two countries had good relations for decades before the revolution, including military cooperation and early de facto as well as official recognition, long before that from any other Muslim country. As geopolitical and religious ties drew Iran closer to front line Arab confrontational states such as Egypt and Syria, the strategic advantages to Iran of a relationship to Israel waned. As the Ayatollah Khomeini returned, he strengthened his own pan Islamic credentials in severing ties with Israel, and throwing his full weight behind the Palestinian cause, going so far as to turn the evacuated Israeli embassy over to the Palestinian Liberation Organization. Khomeini continued to embrace the identity of primary resistance to the Israeli presence in the Middle East, not only rhetorically but in support of powerful military non-state actors such as Hezbollah in their resistance to what they call an “occupation” – i.e., Israel’s existence.
Some commentators, who admit to viewing Iran as “theologically committed to the destruction of Israel” tend to see in the Iranian stance against Israel the specter of the Nazis overarching goal to physically eliminate the Jewish people, and are able to articulate a very long list of anti-Israeli statements made by Iran leaders. Citing, primarily, the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs report on Iran leaders anti-Israeli rhetoric, it is argued that a wide swath of Iranian leadership has called for the specific elimination of the Israeli state, as opposed to a statement about the historical inevitability of same, and that these calls for destruction are made without being tied to specific acts of retaliation for any threading actions which Israel may or may not do to Iran. The document compiles quite a list of vitriolic and threatening statements against the existence of Israel, and some of those statements clearly relish the notion of Israeli deaths.
True, some of the statements are taken in the context of the funeral of militia leaders assassinated by Israel, and some of the threats come directly after events blamed on Israel and the West and in response to what are perceived as military threats. And also true, Israeli leaders were no less antagonistic in their rhetoric, although I think be any measure less dehumanizing, calling Iran a “dark murderous regime, worse than Hitler”.
For the present, low level and proxy antagonism continues, and baring a true sea change, is unlikely to change in the immediately foreseeable future. Iran and Israel are likely to remain, primarily in rhetoric but with some real damage from each side to the other – witness Netanyahu’s effect on the current state of the JPOC agreement. Any call for reconciliation between the West and Iran, especially by a Jewish American, must come to terms with this enmity. Is this possible? To attempt it would entail, I believe addressing the following primary questions:
1)Does Iran deny the Holocaust?
2)Does the Islamic Republic of Iran constitute an existential threat to nation of Israel and the Jews who live there?
3) Does Iranian support of Hezbollah constitute an aggressive or existential threat to Israel and its citizens?
4) Are there circumstances under which Iran and Israeli governments would accept the lasting legitimacy of the other, or at least be willing to pledge a mutual non-interference with the conduct of each others affairs?
5) Is it in Israel’s best interests to continue to make efforts, and be seen as making efforts to prevent Iran from reintegrating into the worlds political and economic order?
The first question, whether Iran denies the Holocaust is of importance both for moral reasons and in the spirit of “those who are ignorant of history are doomed to repeat it”. Considering the both the magnitude and moral horror of the Nazi’s systematic destruction of the Jews, it would be hard to warm to anyone who denies it. Therefore, for moral as well as practical reasons it is worth examining what Iran’s position on this question actually is.
The issue surfaced under the presidency of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Ahmadinejad, who was President of Iran from 2005 to 2013, came into office as a hard liner, reversing previous reform candidates. He gained worldwide notoriety for his hostile and vitriolic comments regarding Israel, the US and Saudi Arabia. Under his presidency, Iran’s openings to the world plummeted. Our tour guide related to us that during Ahmadinejad’s administration he had to stop guiding tours because tourism dried up completely. Ahmadinejad’s election to a second term caused widespread protests within Iran, and he was prevented from running a third time.
What Ahmadinejad is actually quoted as having said is as follows: “Some European countries insist on saying that during World War II, Hitler burned millions of Jews and put them in concentration camps. Any historian, commentator or scientist who doubts that is taken to prison or gets condemned. Although we don’t accept this claim, if we suppose it is true, if the Europeans are honest they should give some of their provinces in Europe, – like in Germany, Austria or other countries, to the Zionists and the Zionists can establish their state in Europe. You offer part of Europe and we will support it”. He later went on to say, “In the second World War, over 60 million people lost their lives. They were all human beings. Why is it that only a select group of those who were killed have become so prominent and important?” And, finally, “And the third question that I raised in this regard, assuming that this happened, where did it happen? Did the Palestinian people have anything to do with it? Why should the Palestinians pay for it now?….You might argue that the Jews have the right to have a government. We’re not against that. But where – at a place where their people were”. Although reading the actual quotes might be seen to show some nuance, still it is hard to argue that Holocaust Denial deserves much nuance to be allowed it. He was universally condemned, and rightly so. What does the current government of Iran have to say about the Holocaust, and about Ahmaninejad’s 2005 statements?
The current president of Iran, Hassan Rouhani, has made efforts to straighten the record. “I can tell you that any crime that happens in history, including the crime the Nazis created towards the Jews, as well as non-Jews, is reprehensible and condemnable.” On another occasion he said “The Nazis carried out a massacre that cannot be denied, especially against the Jewish People….The massacre by the Nazis was condemnable. We never want to sit by side with the Nazis. They committed a crime against Jews – which is a crime against Christians, against Muslim, against all of humanity”. While some have argued me may not have gone far enough, leaving himself some wiggle room regarding the actual magnitude of the massacre, it seems clear that the current government of Iran admits and condemns the Holocaust.
This brings up the next question. Does the Iranian government constitute an existential threat to Israel, specially to the people of Israel? Is it their intention to destroy Israel? Do they have, or could they have the capacity to do so? Again, looking back at the rhetoric of Ahmadinejad from 2005, in which he was widely accused of saying that Iran would “wipe Israel off the map”. There has been a great deal of parsing and interpreting his meaning. Looking at his statements actual translation, Persian language specialists have translated a speech by the Ayatollah as saying “This occupation regime over Jerusalem must finish from the arena of time”. However, the phrase “wipe off the map not only persists but has been displayed prominently in English signs in Iran. Again, the Jerusalem Center for Public affairs have argued that the context of the statements indicate the intent by Ahmadinejad to incite military violence and physical extermination of Israel, using original Farsi wording and translation and arguing, “Iranian leaders are also not talking about a non-directed historical process that will end with Israel’s demise. Rather they are actively advocating Israel’s destruction and have made it clear that they have the it has been maintained, they are advocating for the destruction of Israel and have the will and capacity to effect it. How accurate is this assessment? As to the intention, it is hard to be sure. There remains, however, considerable threatening and vitriolic rhetoric, and even the most progressive attempt to reconcile with Iran can’t ignore that. As far as capacity the issue is clearer.
Fear of a direct war was raised early in 2018 when an Iranian drone crossed into Israeli airspace. Shooting down the jet, Israel also struck agains the Iranian military presence in Syria. As Israeli jets were returning to their bases, one F-16 was shot down, causing the pilot to parachute, and precipitating a large Israeli counterattack, the largest air operation over Syria by Israel in over thirty years. The rapidity and intensity of the escalation lead to widespread media speculation of an impending war. However, as that threat has receded, the possibility of escalation in the near future seems less likely. First of all, a direct Iranian attack on Israel is thought to be very unlikely because not only would it raise the spectre of the massive casualties of the Iran Iraq war, but Iran aircraft and missiles are extremely unlikely to inflict damage on Israel and emerge remotely intact.
Further analysis suggested the the ferocity of Israel’s response to this single drone incursion, called “disproportionate” was intended to decrease the risk of further exchanges by making it clear that any any significant, direct or sustained attack by Iran or Iranian proxies, while inflicting significant pain on Israel, would likely result in “unbearable” damage to Iran, proxies such as Hezbollah, and the civilian populations in which they reside. And while Tehran issued an expected condemnation , unless one believes the Iranian leadership to be completely irrational, not the position of American military leaders, Iran would not wish to escalate conflict with Israel.
Certainly there are voices of concern, much from what we call the political right. The Heritage Foundation, known for its Conservative stance and of some influence in the Trump transition team, views Iranian presence in Syria as an increasingly direct threat to Israel, viewing Iran’s presence both in Syria and Lebanon as part of an overall approach to “the liberation of Jerusalem” and sees Iran trying to build proxy forces in Syria to replicate its strategy of support for Hezbollah in Lebanon. From this point of view, “Iran remains determined to incorporate Syria into its sphere of influence. Iran has deployed a significant fighting force to Syria consisting of Iranian conventional forces and Iran directed coaltions of Shia Militias from Lebanon (Hezbollah), Iraq and Afghanistan’s strategic interests are argued to coincide with Russia’s in making extending jointly needed influence in maintaining relative freedom of movement and extension of influence.
Israeli Defense views this coalition as a single front directed against the state of Israel, and has warned that they will not tolerate Iranian establishment of a military presence in Syria.They have warned against the transfer of “game changing arms”, including accurate missiles into the hands of Hezbollah or Iranian proxies in Syria. However clashes are unlikely to escalate into war. Iran and Israel do not share any border, so a direct ground war between the two is not feasible. Of course, Iran could employ forces of Hezbollah, but it is neither in Hezbollah’s current interests, given its successes in becoming a political force within Lebanon, nor in those of any other of the major parties, neither Israels, Irans, Russias or Syrias. It is true that Hezbollah continues to try to improve their military position, with tunnels and excursions. It should simply be clear to all that Israel retains the right and capability to counter any such activities with military means when necessary.
How can we conclude this train of reasoning? Well, while no one can know the future, and the specter of the 1930s must be of concern not only to Israelis and Jews everywhere, but to any sentient human, still I believe, and I hope these arguments can be seen to demonstrate that:
The Iranian people are not by culture antisemitic.
The current and official position of the Iran is not Holocaust denial.
The Iranian military does not pose, at least in the near and medium term an existential threat, certainly not by capability, to Israel.
Iranian proxies such as Hezbollah could undeniably inflict significant suffering on an Israeli population should it come to war. However there are enough impediments to institution of such a threat that, unless Hezbollah is so self destructively irrational as to bring a certain end to themselves for minimal and unclear consequences, they would not be likely to initiate an aggressive war on Israel, at least not in the short to medium term.
This train of arguments by no means dismisses the antipathy between present day Iran and Israel. Perhaps nothing will. But I think it does make it seem, at least not morally impossible, for a reconciliation to begin between the west and Iran. I asked my Iranian guide, as we were walking together towards my Shabbat evening in Iran, whether there was any possibility of a reconciliation in the future. He replied that Israel and Iran had been allies under the Shah, that Iranian Jews freely travel to Israel, and that while the governments currently view each other as “enemies”, “in the future, who knows, anything is possible”.
As Americans, we have a traditional relationship with the State of Israel for many reasons, and I think most would see it as a moral and historical imperative to be guarantors of Israel’s existence and safety. That does not, in my opinion, mean that we cannot have any relationship whatsoever with those whose rhetoric is anti Israeli. In fact, I believe that an open exchange could improve the safety and decrease than chance of military action against Israel. An Iran situated to mutual benefit within ordered relation of nations, to the reciprocal benefit of each, would be a safer and more stable situation for all, certainly including for Israel. We should, we must be clear and that in any military attack upon Israel we would do whatever was necessary to defend it. This doesn’t mean that our relationships with every other country need be exclusively determined by whether that country supports Israel. I would ask, for reflection, whether the current Israeli government’s very public position subverting the anti-nuclear agreement with Iran, and its re-integration into a global society has more potential to help, or to harm Israel’s long term interests?
Now it is time to consider our own.
Review, Conclusion and Recommendations
Although my personal experience in Iran was as welcoming as it was, I would probably not take such an effort, or presume such a capability to argue for a renewed engagement with Iran if I had not support from published sources by recognized experts. Peter Frankopan, in the work cited above, argues cogently that Iran is a “fulcrum” of economic and military trade and transit not only through the middle east, but across the vast extent of Euro-Asia. At the end of the war, and perhaps still, Russia wanted controlling influence in Iran, not only for its vast oil reserves, he argues, but because of its naval bases, outlet to the sea, and the (then and conceivably again) “location in the middle of a web of international air routes”.
Flynt Leverett, and Hillary Mann Leverett, with prior experience in the National Security Council, the State Department, and the CIA are even more direct and insistent. In their bold and comprehensive Going to Tehran, they have argued that our antipathy towards the revolution in Iran stems from an American desire to act in an imperious fashion. They see our policies as designed to remake the middle east rather than to deal “soberly and effectively with the region’s complex political and security dynamics”. They argue that the effort has been damaging to American standing and interests. (I would cite the Iraq war as an example) They argue that the US has systematically “demonized” would be challengers to its primacy in the region. Finally, they suggest that America’s determination to “keep Iran in a subordinate position has become the biggest single risk to the secure and adequate flow of oil and gas exports from the Persian gulf”. I would argue that our failure to live up to our agreements made regarding the Iran nuclear agreement constitutes one of recent history’s biggest single threats to the use of diplomacy and the standing of the US as a dependable partner in the region. Time will, I fear, make that abundantly clear and to our detriment.
Current Iranian thought regards the region through twin lenses of cooperation and deterrence, in which Iranian political analysts emphasize the “tendency” of Iran toward regional cooperation, but recognize that they are now increasingly “required” to be capable of deterring threats.
Iranian Cooperation in the Region, is it a good thing to be left out of?
Although skeptics would certainly reject the sincerity of an Iranian intellectual, still in a very public and international forum the analysis has been that Iran seeks not to become the dominant military force in the region (see associated image for a comparison of regional arms imports), but rather to become an integrated part of a strong region.
Comparison of regional arms imports – is Iran the country seeking military dominance?
It is argued in this recent public forum , “Iran has explicitly announced that it has no interest in establishing permanent military bases in Syria, for expanding its regional influence, opening up even a so-called “second front” against Israel, as recently discussed by some analysts or the Israeli regime. Iran is well aware of the U.S. obsession to Israel’s security and wants no possible military engagement of the U.S. in Syria that could change the Syrian political scene in favor of the opposition forces.”
Of course one wouldn’t take the word of one Iranian political scientist regarding Iran’s position in the Middle East. There was a recent Al-Jazerra/Johns Hopkins symposium in which experts from various countries were asked to comment on the coming changes in the balance of power in the middle east. “Balance of power…is shifting in the Middle East, where post-cold war American domination is giving way….Russia and China are asserting themselves, even as Iran re-emerges, Turkey engages, and Saudi Arabia displaces Egypt as the Arab center of gravity”. “The “linear” power model of the cold war is over, and power in the region is a a hybrid of relational alliances.” Another panelist pointed out that the weakening of an Arab center owing, to the a schism between Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and the UAE against Qatar, Oman and Kuwait was “debilitating”. Turkey, it was argued, is concerned primarily with containment of its Kurdish population and diversification of its international relationships with Nato and with Russia. This put a relatively resurgent Iran, with its “success in making and keeping strategic partnerships, even with non-state actors” increasingly on the map of power centers. In this authors mind, these would be arguments for more engagement with Iran, not less.
The last section of this essay has been my attempt to argue for the strategic benefits of active American re-engagement with Iran, but that argument is, at least as far as my formal training is concerned, ‘above my pay grade’. I am a doctor, not a professional political scientist. Let me return to the basic points I have made in this argument to conclude.
Iranian Palace Garden
Interior of Shia Mosque
1) My recent visit to Iran showed me that the Iranian people on the street were warm, welcoming, friendly, very much appreciative of an American coming to visit, and hoping for a reengagement with the west. They had been lead to believe it was coming with the international nuclear agreement, were surprised, shocked and saddened when we reneged on that UN sanctioned agreement, but that hasn’t stopped them from wearing New York tee shirts on the streets.
2) I have attempted to review the long history of what I believe are legitimate American grievances against the Islamic Republic of Iran, not to deny their legitimacy. I have also tried to place those grievances within the context of what I believe are also legitimate Iranian grievances with the US and Western alliances. I have argued that there is enough blame to go around, and that a fair and balanced review would bring us, credibly, to a start over point.
3) I have argued then that if the balance of blame is equal, then the JCPOA, the “Iran nuclear deal”, is a fair, balanced, enforceable agreement between Iran, the worlds major powers and the United Nations, and that our withdrawal from that deal, Iran’s compliance with which is disputed with evidence by no one, places the onus to repair the situation squarely on us.
4) Although no American and certainly no Jewish American denies that the antipathy, the rhetoric, the vitriol and threat to our close friend and ally Israel is reprehensible and deserves condemnation, still, I believe and hope that these pages successfully argue, the worst but much trumpeted accusations against Iran, that of Holocaust denial, and “Holocaust preparation” are not supported by a real review of the data. Baring suicidal lunacy from Iran or its regional allies, there is neither an actual existential threat to Israel nor capacity to complete such a threat were there one. Finally, and perhaps as importantly, I would ask the question. Did our withdrawal from the arms agreement and our exclusion of dialogue with Iran, so very publicly making both ourselves and Israel to blame for it, improve either our security or Israel’s?
5) Finally, using recent published sources of thought and discussion, I have argued that the balance of power, and perhaps as importantly the balance of opportunity in the middle east is shifting, Iran’s role remains central, other international competitors have taken advantage of that, and we stand the risk of giving up an important political, diplomatic, economic and military opening which we lose to our detriment, and which we won’t get back.
I would suggest if anyone in a position of authority were to listen that we take three simple, initial steps. which would, I believe, go worlds in transforming a mutually dangerous and detrimental situation towards one of real possibilities:
1) Reengage in the international agreement we already signed, rejoin the JCPOA, and drop the sanctions against Iran.
2) Offer a good faith agreement to Iran for each government to simply suspend negative public statements about the other for a, say, two year moratorium. Encourage the leaders of both Iran and Israel to make the same good faith public negative statement moratorium. Offer to refer to Iran by its official name as “the Islamic Republic of Iran” in exchange for Iran referring to us as ‘The United States of America” and to Israel as “the state of Israel”.
3) Reaffirm, although nothing in these actions should cause it to be doubted, that in any military attack on Israel in which hostilities were instituted against Israel, we would provide whatever military assistance required to defend it. That should not mean we refrain from active dialogue with Iran. It might make it all the more essential.
More active steps, such as formal culture exchanges, People to People ambassador type visits, could await further political developments.
I asked someone why, if there is such interest in reconciliation with the rest of the world, why there still remained “Death to America” rhetoric. I was told that most of this comes from hard liners, that you do not hear it from the average person and that generally, (but not always) the current leaders are more moderate. He also said that they can’t change so publicly because “then they’d have to admit that for thirty years, they have been wrong, and no one wants to do that!” Well our leadership doesn’t seem like the type to want to do that either. The Leverett’s conclude their comprehensive and persuasive book with a simple line, “It’s time for an American president to go to Tehran”.
Well this American citizen has gone to Tehran.
I would suggest perhaps it is time for other Americans to open up minds to doing the same.
You might be very pleasantly surprised.
( The author wishes to thank Sam McManus of YellowWood Adventures, and both Daryoosh Minoui and Ms. Maryam Tayarani of Iran Doostan Tours, without whom this visit to Iran would not have been possible. At the present time, an American cannot travel in Iran except on a formal tour. )
Dr Rick Nierenberg is an emergency physician. Although not formally trained in political science, he has a long history of interest in politics, history, travel, and diplomacy.