Washington Week: Student Voices (O)

Iran mainly to blame for poor relations, says Iranian expert
By Steve Gehrke
Daily Utah Chronicle (U. Utah)
03/07/2006

(U-WIRE) SALT LAKE CITY — Iran is a nationalist-minded country, and its general distrust of globalization has made relations with the United States almost uniformly bad for the past 27 years, an international expert born in Iran said at a University of Utah talk.

Shahram Chubin, director of research at the Geneva Centre for Security Policy, said that while both the United States and Iran are responsible for the poor relations, the bulk of the blame lies with the Iranians.

"Their self-image is a mix of superiority and victim," he said Thursday in the latest installment of the Middle East Lecture Series. "They are self-centered, self-absorbed...and they insist today on the Islamic Revolution model as a role model to other nations to confront aggressors — the resistance unity."

Chubin, who was educated in Great Britain and the United States, said the Bush administration has done its part with a disastrous foreign policy in many parts of the Middle East, resulting in the United States being viewed as the "great Satan" and the source of all evil and woes. But meanwhile, Iran has exploited crises to deepen schisms, giving it similar status in the United States.

One of the latest examples has been Iran using Islam to promote a civilization and culture conflict, he said.

"They seek to expose the United States' Achilles' heel: Israel," Chubin said, adding that the U.S. bias in favor of Israel creates an opening for Iran to use Islamic identity against the United States.

"The Middle East is feeling anger from Iraq and confusion and disorientation from globalization," Chubin said. "That leaves openings for extreme positions that appeal to Islamic masses — basically saying 'screw you' to America by being implacable, standing up and demonstrating through martyrdom."

In 2002, when Bush declared Iran a part of the "Axis of Evil," Chubin said Iranians were scared of the United States — even into May 2003 after the military victory in Iraq, Iran would have negotiated on the nuclear issue, but negotiations were cut off by the United States because Iran was accused of hosting some al-Qaida operatives.

By the end of 2003 that period had passed, he said, and Iran saw that the United States was bogged down in Iraq. That's why, Chubin said, Iran has been "extremely confident" and made bold moves, such as cutting off nuclear visitation rights to international watchdogs.

Now, he said, if the United States leaves Iraq and civil war erupts, Arab nations will side with the Sunnis and Iran will side with the Shiite Muslims, causing a wider-scale war.

Chubin said it is not technology across the board that matters when dealing with weapons, but the nature of the regimes that possess them. Chubin said the United States can only successfully approach regime change in Iran through engagement — not by threat.

"To talk issue by issue is not enough. To talk technology issues is not enough," Chubin said. "The two parties must talk about broader issues without talking about leverage."

He warned that the United States should not explore military options because it does not know where all the targets are, because Iran could be seen as the victim of America gone berserk again, because retaliation could come in the form of terror and missiles directed at U.S. allies and because a strike sometimes consolidates regimes rather than leading to changes.

"An attack would accelerate a program under a regime firmly in the saddle pleading victim," he said.

Mike Murrell, graduate student in Middle East studies, said Chubin's lecture was interesting, especially his focus on both sides deserving some level of blame for the current state of relations.

"He was really thought-provoking," Murrell said.

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