A last best hope

A nuclear Iran, argues Ayman El-Amir*, is not such a bad thing

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Iran faces intense psychological warfare over its alleged quest for nuclear weapons. Its uranium enrichment programme has been probed by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), negotiated over by senior members of the European Union and is closely monitored by both Washington and Tel Aviv. The international community, long resigned to the fact that the flawed Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) is unevenly enforced, stands idly by. Meanwhile the Arabs remain checked by Israel's superior military power in a world dominated by the US. But should, by any twist of fate, Iran manage to survive the pressure, including the threat of military strikes, and emerge as a nuclear power, it may be the region's last and best hope for a balanced and durable peace.

This contention may sound as outrageous as its premise is simple. No matter how many sermons are preached about the international rule of law, the peaceful settlement of disputes and the protection of the weak against the strong, we live in a world ruled by military supremacists. Since the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1990 the international landscape has been shaped by a single superpower, the United States. Few would argue that in exercising its global role Washington has acted responsibly, let alone justly or selflessly.

One of the key objectives of US national security strategy, outlined by President George W Bush in September 2002, is to ensure that American military supremacy is never challenged again. President Bush has also vowed to use America's superior military power to launch strikes against perceived threats. This pre-emptive doctrine has been graphically demonstrated in Afghanistan and Iraq, while Israel's continuing attacks against Palestinians serves as a daily reminder of Arab impotence in the face of Israel's military machine.

Israel, backed by the US and some Western powers, has assumed the role of unchallenged regional strongman. For almost five decades Washington has ensured that Israel has maintained military superiority over all of the Arab states combined. This has been a rule of thumb of the US national security strategy since 1958. Recognising that its quantitative military advantage could one day be overtaken in the 1960s and into the early 1970s, Israelis successfully developed nuclear weapons to retain a qualitative military edge and overwhelming deterrent against the Arabs.

Not that the Arabs did not have a chance to develop nuclear weapon programmes of their own. It is just that they buckled under the first sign of pressure from Israel's influential allies. Arab quests for parity were never seriously pursued. Egypt had to sign and later ratify the NPT as part of the 1978 Camp David accords without extracting a single concession from Israel. In the mid-1990s, at the United Nations NPT review conference, Egypt was persuaded by Washington to recommit itself, unconditionally and finally, to its full treaty obligations while it remained unable to secure even a token commitment to a time-table under which Israel would begin to submit its nuclear programme to international scrutiny.

The disintegration of the former Soviet Union in 1990 left scores of nuclear scientists up for grabs at bargain prices. No Arab country tried to take advantage of the situation and the US and Israel quickly scooped them up. A bizarre anecdote recounted by Mohamed Hassanein Heikal in the aftermath of the 1973 October War had Libya's Colonel Gaddafi dispatching his prime minister, Abdel- Salam Jalloud, to China with a $400 million cheque in hand in order to purchase a nuclear bomb. It took all the wisdom and patience of the late Chinese Premier Chou-en-Lai to persuade the visitor that atomic bombs are not the kind of commodity that can be bought off the shelf.

There is no question that Iran, a member of President Bush's "axis of evil", is facing serious threats from the US and Israel. Washington has left "all options", including the military option, open and Israel has made it clear that it is not prepared to live with Iran as a nuclear power. For almost a year France, the UK and Germany have been negotiating with Tehran over its uranium enrichment programme with little success.

The world needs to return to a system of international checks and balances. A decade and a half of US hegemony and Israeli militarism in the Middle East has resulted in the pursuit of narrow self-interests and deterioration of the international situation. Multilateralism has been side-lined, terrorism has snowballed, international legitimacy, along with the UN, has been undermined, and the world has become less safe.

The years of the Cold War represent the 20th century's most peaceful times. A great deal has been written about the balance of nuclear power that prevailed between the US and the Soviet Union for most of the second half of the 20th century, and the conclusion is that, in general, nuclear powers, acutely aware of the endgame, act responsibly. The Soviet Union and the US, despite many crises and conflicting interests, never came to nuclear blows. Even during the Cuban missile crisis of 1962, when the world seemed closer than ever to disaster, the two superpowers paused on the brink of nuclear war, took a deep breath, a step back and saved themselves and the world.

India and Pakistan, two modern- day nuclear powers that fought three wars in the second half of the 20th century and which continue to have intermittent skirmishes over Kashmir, are further from an all- out war today than they were a decade ago.

US hegemony, alongside Israel's regional nuclear monopoly, is neither sustainable, nor does it offer a recipe for durable peace. A new strategic balance of power is needed in the Middle East, with an Iranian-Iraqi partnership as its axis. A nuclear-empowered Iran would be a nightmare for both the US and Israel. From the Middle East, though, it increasingly looks as though the only way to secure a modicum of strategic equilibrium in a region that other powers, particularly China, is to encourage and safeguard against looming threats.

* The writer is former correspondent for Al-Ahram in Washington, DC. He also served as director of United Nations Radio and Television in New York.