A realistic attitude

Washington's highest flying hawks concede that using force against Iran is not a viable option, reports Khaled Dawoud from the US capital

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That US President George W Bush gave only a lukewarm welcome to the agreement reached between Tehran and the European Union on the suspension of Iran's uranium enrichment programme belies the fact that Washington has no other alternatives in dealing with what it views as the serious threat of Iran developing nuclear weapons.

"Well, let's say I hope it's true," Bush told reporters in his first reaction to the deal reached between Iran and France, Germany and the UK, known as the EU-3. "I think the definition of truth is the willingness of the Iranian government to allow verification. They have said some things in the past, and it's very important for them to verify and earn the trust of those of us who are worried about them developing a nuclear weapon," he added.

Tehran scored an apparent victory in reaching the agreement and for the time being will escape US pressure to have the case referred to the Security Council as a first step towards sanctions being imposed against Iran.

The deal came into effect on the eve of the meeting of the Vienna-based International Atomic Energy Agency's (IAEA) Board of Governors today (Thursday) to review Iran's nuclear activities. IAEA Director Mohamed El-Baradie has already indicated that he believes Tehran has acted on its promise to suspend uranium enrichment.

"I think pretty much everything has come to a halt right now," Al-Baradie told reporters on Monday.

But the hawks who dominate the second term Bush administration appear unwilling to abandon their push for a confrontation with Tehran. Unsourced reports leaked to the US media claimed Iran was speeding up the production of large quantities of enriched uranium ahead of the deadline agreed with the EU-3 while diehard, pro-Israel media outlets highlighted reports published in Israeli newspapers, quoting army sources claiming Tehran was running a secret nuclear weapons programme parallel to the one inspected by the IAEA. Iran has denied both reports.

Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage, who announced his resignation following that of his boss, Colin Powell, said on Monday that Washington was adopting a firmer policy towards Tehran than the EU but ruled out any military confrontation with Tehran. "My view would be that the incentives of the Europeans only work against the backdrop of the United States being strong and firm on this issue. In the vernacular, it's a kind of good cop/bad cop arrangement. If it works we'll all have been successful. If it fails, we'll all fail," he told the Qatari- satellite channel, Al-Jazeera. While maintaining the official line that "all options are always on the table" Armitage said that "we want this issue to be resolved by peaceful means. War is obviously not an option that we want to consider if we can help it."

One rumour doing the Washington rounds is that Armitage will be replaced by John Bolton, a prominent neo-conservative who for the last four years has been in charge of the disarmament file at the State Department. If this happens it would suggest the White House is keen to ratchet up the pressure not only on Iran but also Syria. Bolton has in the past made the case for regime change in both countries.

Yet whatever the complexion of senior officials in the State Department most commentators exclude the possibility of any military action against Iran. The US is bogged down in Iraq and is likely to be amenable to a compromise deal with Tehran over its nuclear programme in return for cooperation in restoring stability to Iraq.

Geoffrey Kemp, an expert on Iran at the Nixon Center and who served in the White House during the Reagan administration, said that the Iranians obviously have the capacity to create problems for the US in Iraq. "The future of the Iranian nuclear programme and the stability of Iraq are to some extent intertwined. For this reason the US must work diligently for a more diplomatic solution to the nuclear crisis, and this can only be done if there is a common agenda with the EU which allows no room for dissent that Iran can exploit."

In an interview with Al-Ahram Weekly David Kay, former head of the Iraq Survey Group and the first to scotch US claims that the former Iraqi regime possessed stockpiles of banned weapons of mass destruction, agrees that the use of force against Iran is not an option.

"I think for four years the administration hasn't had a policy towards Iran, and I don't see any clarity yet as to what that policy might be," he said. "Clearly some of them believe in a very hard-line policy; that is: no deal, we simply say you give up everything like Libya and then we'll talk to you, but no discussion. But there are others, I think, that are more pragmatic, and realise that given our position in Iraq, given the nature of their national energy market, given the Europeans, then we need a more adaptive policy which would try to engage the Iranians, to talk about the consequence of a nuclear programme, to talk about other alternative security arrangements in the Gulf. I think there are some in the administration who realise that a chaotic Iraq is not necessarily in Iran's interests."

Bush's scepticism over the Iran/EU-3 deal was to be expected, Kay argues, given Iran's record. "But one thing we share with the Europeans is we have no good answer to what to do if the Iranians do ignore the deal and go forward to the nuclear weapon. There is not much of a stomach in this city for military action and it is very hard to imagine economic sanctions that really work, especially after the Chinese have already said they will veto them in the Security Council, and the Europeans have also shown no stomach for sanctions."

"I don't think there is a stomach for surgical strikes -- I'm sure they've been planning exercises but not at the point when you're approaching 1,500 dead Americans in Iraq, when questions are being raised about the future and the military is very stretched." There is, Kay added, no agreement on "what's the second step, what's the second move, what's the third move".

"I think there is more scepticism inside the administration and recognition that Iraq is not going the way people thought it would two years ago. I wouldn't describe such stand as moderate, but I would describe it as a realistic view that this region is really hard, that there are no easy answers, no quick transforming events, and it's going to take time. I think that's a realistic attitude."