InsightMag.com
Yes: The Iranian
terrorist regime poses a danger to the United States and its
allies.
By
Kenneth R. Timmerman
On June 2, a massive blast
triggered by a Palestinian suicide bomber ripped through a nightclub
in Tel Aviv killing 20 people and injuring more than 80. The
terrorist groups Hamas and Islamic Jihad claimed responsibility. Both
groups, which are affiliated with the Palestinian Authority of Yasser
Arafat, are financed by the government of the Islamic Republic of
Iran through official subsidies approved each year by Iranís
state parliament, or Majlis.
Terrorists from Hamas and
Islamic Jihad regularly travel to Iran, where they are trained by
Iranís Revolutionary Guards and by the Ministry of Information
and Security (MOIS) in bomb-making techniques. They are taught how to
use false documents, pass border inspections and transfer money
worldwide. They are instructed how to maintain clandestine contact
with their Iranian government handlers. Without state support from
the Islamic Republic of Iran, terrorist attacks such as this latest
suicide bombing would be far more difficult.
On April 12, 1996, the
Israelis arrested Hussein Mohammed Mikdad, a Lebanese Shiite who
subsequently admitted that his Iranian handlers had instructed him to
hand-carry a bomb onto an El Al flight originating in Tel Aviv. The
only reason the Israelis caught Mikdad was his own incompetence.
While preparing the bomb in his East Jerusalem hotel room, he
suffered the misfortune of setting it off in his own lap. Mikdad
entered Israel on a forged British passport provided him by Iranian
intelligence.
The Israelis had less luck
with the Iranian-trained bomber who drove an explosive-rigged van
into an Israeli bus in Gaza on April 9, 1995, killing seven Israelis
and one U.S. citizen, a 20-year-old student from New Jersey named
Alisa Flatow. Lawsuits filed by her parents led a U.S. court to
condemn the government of Iran to pay her family $247.5 million in
damages.
Advocates of lifting U.S.
sanctions on Iran argue that the re-election of a so-called
ìmoderateî cleric, Mohammed Khatami, as Iranís
president on June 8 will end the terror spree and that sanctions only
reinforce his hard-line opponents. But since Khatamiís first
election as president in 1997, he has met repeatedly in Tehran with
the leaders of Hamas, Islamic Jihad and Lebanonís Hezbollah.
Iranís subsidies to these groups have continued unabated at
the rate of around $100 million per year. In fact, as Ministry of
Islamic Guidance in 1983, Khatami was one of the original founders of
the worldwide Hezbollah movement.
Last October, after one
such meeting with Hamas terrorists in Tehran, Khatami proclaimed that
only the annihilation of the state of Israel would bring peace to the
Middle East. ìThey are basically an occupying entity,î
he said of the Israeli government. ìNaturally, any government
that is based on oppression and injustice may stay in power for a
while, but ultimately it is doomed to failure. Ö Real peace can
only be achieved through an end to occupation.î
Inside Iran, the reign of
terror has accelerated under Khatamiís presidency. Despite his
claims to promote ìliberalization,î Khatamiís
security forces have closed reform-minded newspapers, assassinated
dissidents and, in May, shut down Iranian access to the Internet.
On the evening of Nov. 22,
1998, mysterious intruders burst into the Tehran home of secular
opposition leaders Darioush and Parvaneh Forouhar, hacking the
elderly couple to death and sexually mutilating their corpses. It
turned out the murderers were members of Iranís security
services, acting on orders from a top deputy of one of
Khatamiís key government ministers.
Since the gruesome murder
of the Forouhars, agents of Iranís security services have
executed another half-dozen secular writers. Despite his protests of
innocence, Khatami has done nothing to stop such killings or to
restrain the intelligence services from their reign of terror.
On the contrary. In July
1999, students at Tehran University revolted against domestic
repression and called for greater freedom. In response, the Tehran
police stormed student dormitories, killing five students, including
at least one person thrown to his death from a three-story window.
Instead of backing the students and their calls for reform, the
ìmoderateî Khatami called on students to end their
demonstrations.
Many of those who support
lifting U.S. sanctions on Iran argue that free trade would subvert
the radical Islamic regime by exposing ordinary Iranians to Western
culture. But Iranians are very sophisticated, thank you. Many of the
current regimeís leaders were in fact educated in the West.
Tens of thousands of Iranians travel every year from Iran to the
United States, while several times that number travel regularly to
Europe and even to Israel. U.S. sanctions did not exclude the sale of
consumer goods to Iran until 1995. The reason Western notions of
freedom and free trade do not flourish in todayís Iran is not
because they are foreign concepts, but because the regime has
demonstrated again and again that it brutally will quash any
challenge to its monopoly on power.
Opponents of U.S. sanctions
on Iran include some of Americaís largest and most successful
multinational corporations. They stand to gain billions of dollars in
potential trade should they succeed in getting sanctions lifted. Put
politely, their arguments emit a faint odor of self-interest.
USA*Engage, originally
established in 1996 as a mouthpiece for Conoco and Unocal, claims the
United States is ìshooting itself in the footî by
maintaining trade sanctions on Iran since foreign companies are more
than willing to fill the breach left by the U.S. boycott.
There is some merit to this
argument. Russia and China are conducting cash-and-carry sales of
modern weaponry and the strategic equipment Iran needs to build
ballistic missiles and nuclear-power plants. Some U.S. companies
might be tempted to follow in their path. U.S. sanctions block these
companies from pursuing sales that clearly violate our national
interests. If that is shooting ourselves in the foot, then we should
keep shooting.
Other countries such as
France, Italy, Germany and Japan clearly want to help Iran develop
its oil and gas fields. But the lack of laws to protect foreign
investment in Iran has helped deter many companies from committing
major capital to such projects. Do U.S. oil companies want to invest
in Iran without protection? Are they prepared to send American
citizens to work in Iranian gas fields while pro-regime thugs
continue to trample the U.S. flag on the streets of Tehran?
Added to this high-risk
environment are U.S. secondary sanctions, known as the Iran Libya
Sanctions Act (ILSA), which is up for renewal this summer. ILSA was
passed in 1996 because the U.S. Congress and the Clinton
administration agreed it was not in our national interest to help
prop up the current regime in Iran by investing in its oil and gas
industry.
The ILSA sanctions have
helped to deny Iran the technology and capital it needs to rebuild
its oil and gas industries, which still account for some 90 percent
of Iranian gross national product. New figures released in May by the
International Monetary Fund show Iranís economy has shrunk by
12 percent from its size a decade ago, despite surging oil prices.
The figures also show Iran to be one of only 11 countries outside
Africa and the former Soviet bloc where per capita income actually
fell throughout the 1990s while the rest of the world experienced an
economic boom.
U.S. sanctions were not the
root cause of Iranís economic woes: Chronic corruption and
mismanagement by Iranian government planners did the trick. But U.S.
sanctions have made a significant contribution ó so much so
that the Iranian government lodged an official complaint with the
International Court of Justice in 1996, accusing the United States of
economic ìsabotage.î
Lifting U.S. sanctions
against Iran before significant changes are made in the repressive
and terrorist behavior of the Iranian regime only would encourage
hard-liners to continue their assault on fundamental freedoms and
human decency. Liberalizing trade amounts to a cash advance drawn
against the hope of future good behavior by Tehranís ruling
clerics.
The previous administration
tried throwing sops to Tehran on several occasions without any
improvement in Iranian government behavior. The ban on American
imports of Iranian carpets, dried fruits, nuts and caviar was lifted
last year. Visa requirements were loosened and academic exchanges
encouraged. Before that, the administration quietly allowed the sale
of U.S. aircraft spare parts to Iran. So far, the Iranian government
has yet to make a single gesture in response.
Iran continues to build
long-range ballistic missiles while pursuing a clandestine
nuclear-weapons program. A major influx of U.S. capital and advanced
technology would give these efforts a shot in the arm.
Instead of finding new ways
of appeasing a bloodthirsty regime that wishes America no good, the
United States should encourage democrats inside Iran to pursue their
quest to end the dictatorship of a radical, anti-Western clergy.
Lifting sanctions might fatten the bottom line of a few selected U.S.
companies, but it would do severe damage to our national
security.
Timmerman, a senior writer at Insight, is a former
writer for Time and other journals. He repeatedly has
testified before Congress on issues concerning Iran.
No: Sanctions only
punish American workers and weaken our national
security.
By Archie
Dunham
The Iran Libya Sanctions
Act (ILSA) should not be renewed. I said publicly five years ago that
it should not be enacted; we now have five years of failed policy and
ineffective secondary boycotts against non-U.S. companies that prove
the folly of this approach.
You may think it odd that I
ó representing an American oil company ó should oppose
a law that purports to level the playing field for us against our
international competitors. The fact is, ILSA doesnít help my
company, and it certainly doesnít help my country. It is not
the highest moral choice, it threatens our national security and it
doesnít work because it is the wrong tool for the problem it
is supposed to solve. Itís time for Washington to correct its
mistake and get to work on real solutions.
Supporters of ILSAís
renewal claim this is the right moral choice, but I believe
differently. As I write this, I am in the Middle East. A suicide
bomber in Tel Aviv has taken the lives of 20 innocent people. My
heart goes out to the families of these victims. It also goes out to
the families, known only to God, of those who may pay with their
lives if there is retaliation. When the vast majority of peace-loving
people in the world witness the atrocious acts of a violent few but
seem powerless to exert their will over a small minority to stem the
hatred and hostility, what can we do? When each new death, on any
side, only deepens the animosities and invites further violence, how
do we reverse the momentum and create sustainable conditions of
peace, harmony and prosperity?
I am excited that the
United States stands at a crossroads in history where unrivaled
opportunity intersects self-inflicted consequence. But how will we
choose? On the low road lies the invitation to be just another
combatant, abandon whatever facade of evenhandedness remains and
support the continuing hostilities with attitudes, words, threats,
laws, penalties and even arms. We ride down this road on a high
horse, pointing an accusing finger and expecting others to be drawn
to our ìprincipledî policy.
On this path, American
morality looks false and empty, as it refuses to understand all sides
and to acknowledge the motivation of all interested parties. We
expect to exert leadership from a distant fortress, and we disengage
from the hard work of real diplomacy and real defense. We try to
punish both friend and foe into toeing our line. This course is
futile. Who honestly sees any relationship between such behaviors and
our nationís founding values and principles?
On the high road lies the
opportunity to lead with a human touch, to engage all sides in
discussion, to align exclusively with none and to support all who
work peacefully for the good of all. We offer our respect and
legitimacy, our active engagement ó including investments,
diplomacy, aid and international institutional memberships.
Americans like to think of
themselves as a Godly nation. We therefore should preach a morality
that stems from our common ancestor, Abraham, and that embodies
Godís commandment to love our neighbor ó even the
unlovable one. This is characterized by a humility of which President
George W. Bush often has spoken. If we lift up our nationís
unifying values, we will draw all people to us, just as our economic
system and democratic form of government now serve as a beacon for
all yearning peoples.
But if we try to punish,
bully and coerce others into adopting our choices of behavior, we
will drive them away. Indeed, we are driving them away. If we try to
push with hatred rather than pull with love, our hope for peace and
moderation will backfire. In my travels, I find to my dismay that
much of the world resents the power of the United States and is not
convinced that we use it responsibly and caringly.
Renewing a sanctions law
that has not worked and makes friend and foe both feel victimized
only will convince a few million more people that we are uninformed
of Middle East culture and values and are not committed to peace in
the region. ILSA may be aimed at foreign corporations, but it sends a
clear and powerful signal about the prevailing American mind-set
toward the world in general, not just toward two critical countries
in a region of vital national interest.
ILSA threatens our
long-term energy security. It offers a cheap domestic political vote,
but it then damages a range of U.S. national-security interests
worldwide ó interests that all Americans share.
Consider energy. Commercial
activity that discovers and distributes energy is a key U.S.
national-security interest ó a fact that never is appreciated
until supplies run short and a crisis descends. California, the
worldís sixth-largest economy, is instructive. Beyond the
blackouts yet to come (on the East Coast as well), Californians face
challenges to the public safety, business closures and departures
from the state, and potential new investors locating elsewhere to
avoid the risks caused by inadequate energy supply and source
diversity.
California, long a
trendsetting state, is suffering an energy shortfall that highlights
the risks faced by the entire nation. Unless America moves quickly to
solve its energy-diversity problem, Californiaís predicament
could surface in all 50 states. If ILSA is allowed to expire on Aug.
5 ó as is legislated ó and the corresponding
presidential Executive Orders that prevent American companies from
investing in Iran and Libya finally are rescinded, significant
amounts of new energy will be available faster and more plentifully
than through any other means. The international-energy industry
considers Iran and Libya the two most attractive countries in which
to develop new oil resources in the world.
ILSA will not stop those
developments from occurring, no matter what Congress passes, but it
will cause a trade war with Europe and seriously complicate diplomacy
for the president far beyond the Middle East. And, given the message
this law conveys toward the Arab world, how will this action square
with the hope for Arab producers to favor the United States with
increased production? It is a direct conflict. As always with
unilateral sanctions, the only losers will be American consumers,
workers, farmers and voters.
Vice President Richard
Cheney correctly has emphasized that conservation will help, as will
increasing domestic-energy supplies. But such actions cannot balance
energy supply when demand is increasing globally.
ILSA doesnít work.
It has not stopped terrorism or the proliferation of weapons of mass
destruction. Nor has it achieved justice and compensation for the Pan
Am Flight 103 victimsí families ó the justifications
proffered for ILSA. In fact, many experts believe ILSA and, more
generally, unilateral sanctions actually worsen these problems. They
encourage the offending actors to establish relationships with other
groups and states that profess hostile anti-American ideologies or
that are eager to sell weapons and technologies.
The notion that sanctions
deprive these states of energy income that they might use for
nefarious purposes is conventional wisdom that cannot stand scrutiny.
Prices set by global oil markets nullify any impact of sanctions on
government revenues in Iran and Libya. While Iranís production
was constant throughout the 1990s, its income doubled from 1998 to
2000 in direct relationship to the world price of oil. Paradoxically,
to whatever extent sanctions diminish global energy supply, they push
up prices, thus increasing the income of sanctioned states. Lawmakers
who wish to renew ILSA prefer to ignore these realities.
Supporters of ILSA need to
look carefully at the larger world. Shocks to the global-energy
system seem increasingly probable. Because energy supplies are tight,
a single shock at any point in the system will have significant
negative consequences on all parts and major effects on the most
vulnerable (high-consuming) parts unless additional supply is
created.
What if the
sanctions-supportersí fantasies came true and Iranís
government fell? When that happened in 1979, 2 million barrels per
day were wiped off the global market, sending oil prices to $45 per
barrel and causing a 2 percent drop in U.S. gross domestic product.
Does any member of the U.S. Congress imagine that such a catastrophe
could not happen again? Iran, with its population of 70 million
people, 70 percent of whom are under the age of 30, should be our
friend, not our enemy. We certainly donít have an abundance of
friends in the Middle East!
ILSA is the wrong tool. The
Middle East has many problems requiring real solutions, not phony
policies offering punishment rather than processes that stimulate
change. If we are serious about combating terrorism, letís use
instruments that attack terrorism. If we wish to promote political
change, economic engagement is a proven, powerful tool, as Secretary
of State Colin Powell repeatedly has said. It offers a number of
high-road opportunities to re-establish broken relations with
countries whose interests ultimately are compatible with our own.
To anyone prepared honestly
to understand Iran and Libya today, itís obvious that both
countries wish to enhance their relations with the United States
ó not necessarily with our government, but certainly with the
American people, whom they like. To any serious watcher of the Middle
East, it is obvious that our Arab friends and allies increasingly are
becoming distant. They are becoming more aligned with those we choose
to demonize and victimize, and they reject our disengagement.
Members of Congress
cosponsoring the ILSA renewal bill should brace for some tough
questions from their constituents, who may find themselves in gas
lines, in the dark or in suffocating heat or freezing cold. Let those
lawmakers explain why they lost the Middle East for ìthe right
symbolic voteî or ìthe need to show resolve.î See
if the American public buys it.
The media often caricature
energy companies as being greedy, with no concern for the national
interest. We are, of course, public corporations owned by millions of
American shareholders. But first and most importantly, we love
America. We profoundly believe the American spirit of free enterprise
has a major contribution to make toward promoting peace and
prosperity around the world, and engagement always has been the best
approach to diplomacy.
Even if relations with Iran
and Libya remain rocky, working with them, not against them, is
essential to U.S. national security. It also is a moral and historic
imperative. ILSA is the low road. Letís take the high
road.
Dunham is president and chief executive officer of Conoco Inc., an
international energy company in Houston, and is a longtime critic of
unilateral sanctions.
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