I caught a few minutes of Trump's Saudi Arabia speech this
morning and I thought it unfortunate. By lambasting Iran he (consciously or
not) places Rouhani in a difficult situation.
Rouhani, who just won re-election, ran on a platform of
liberalisation and rapprochement with the West. The fact that he won
convincingly says a lot about the trajectory of Iranian society. The ayatollahs
are in control but at the same time they don't want a repeat of the violence we
saw in 2009-11. We saw it because whether they like it or not, social media
broadcast it to the world.
But then comes Trump. His speech all but endorses the Saudi
policy and the Middle Eastern Cold War between Riyadh and Tehran. The new
weapons deals mean a continuation and escalation of the Yemen War, and perhaps
the ongoing proxy conflict in Syria. Trump said the new multi-billion dollar
deal would make the military community very happy. He wasn't supposed to frame
it that way. It's bad for diplomacy and optics but he was just being truthful.
Obama had feigned concern for the civilians of Yemen and
restricted some Saudi weapons sales. He did this to throw a bone to the various
'monitoring' organisations who have been watching with growing concern as the US
proxy war has led to a humanitarian crisis, collapse and starvation.
And yet Trump has no such concerns when it comes to
appearances, official narratives, and actions which provide a basis for some
form of plausible deniability.
The Saudis endured his whore-wife because the American
president comes bearing gold and guns. I'm sorry if some think that unkind but
it is nevertheless true. And what would happen to Melania if she were a Saudi
woman? How would they treat her?
Rouhani is stuck. How can he reach out to a hostile White
House? How can he work toward peace and a
modus vivendi when Washington has just upped the ante? The ayatollahs are
undoubtedly chuckling as Trump's speech has just wounded the process of
liberalisation. His speech was a gift to them.
I look for Rouhani to press hard. France comes to mind, or
even a desperate-to-be-relevant Britain, though Theresa May is not liked.
Tehran can nevertheless work with these Western alternatives as a means to keep
things moving during the Trump years.
The thing is, what else will the Trump years bring? And, can the
Reformist-Ayatollah dance in Tehran keep slowing down the ticking time clock
that is Iranian society?
"Theresa May is not liked."
ReplyDeleteNevertheless her front man on foreign affairs is the serial adulterer, fabricator of newspaper articles and other lies, US Citizen Boris Johnson.
Boris Johnson wrote on October 12, 2006
www dot boris-johnson dot com /2006/10/12/iran/
"Give Iran the bomb: it might make the regime more pliable."
Seems like just the man (considering his Islamic Turkish ancestry) who would be welcomed by the hard line Ayotollahs. He might even be able to sell them some centrifuge technology from Urenco.
Apparently UK military arms dealers have been doing considerable trade with Iran over the past few years despite sanctions and no doubt with Her Britannic Majesty's government looking the other way so as not to impede sales by one of the few remaining profitable manufacturing industries.