IRAN GAMBLES OVER GEORGIA’S CRISIS
By Kaveh L Afrasiabi
Asia Times Online
Aug 16, 2008
Hong Kong
Georgia is one of Iran’s "near neighbors" and as a result of
geographical proximity and important political and geostrategic
considerations, the current Russia-Georgia conflict is closely watched
by Tehran, itself under threat of military action by the US and or
Israel, which may now feel less constrained about attacking Iran in
light of Russia’s war with Georgia.
So far, Tehran has not adopted an official position, limiting itself
to a telephone conference between Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki
and his Russian counterpart, Sergei Lavrov, expressing Iran’s desire to
see a speedy end of the conflict for the sake of "peace and stability
in the region". Tehran’s dailies have likewise refrained from in-depth
analyses of the crisis and from providing
editorial perspectives, and the government-owned media have stayed
clear of any coverage that might raise Moscow’s objection.
Behind Iran’s official silence is a combination of factors. These
range from Iran’s common cause with Moscow against expansion of the
North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), interpreting this crisis
as a major setback for NATO’s "eastward expansion" in light of the
unabashed pro-West predilections of Tbilisi’s government, to Iran’s
sensitivity to Russia’s national security concerns. The latter are
heightened by the US’s plans to install anti-missile systems in
Eastern Europe, not to overlook Iran’s concern as not to give the
Kremlin any ammunition that could be used against it in Tehran’s
standoff over its nuclear program.
Representing a serious new rift in US-Russia relations, the conflict
in the Caucasus, paralyzing the UN Security Council and igniting
Cold War-type rhetoric between the two military superpowers,
is simultaneously a major distraction from the Iran nuclear
crisis and may even spell doom for the multilateralist "Iran Six"
diplomacy. This involves the US, Britain, Russia, France, China
and Germany in negotiations over Iran’s uranium-enrichment program,
which some believed is aimed at making nuclear weapons.
Much depends on the scope and duration of the Georgia crisis and,
yet, there is also the obverse possibility that Moscow, intent on
polishing its tarnished image – as a rogue power coercing its smaller
neighbors and violating their territorial sovereignty – may even
double its efforts on other fronts to compensate for the damage to
its international standing, given the US’s threat of kicking Russia
out of the Group of Eight.
As far as Iran is concerned, the Georgia crisis is not confined to
South Caucasus and has broader implications for region, including
Central Asia and the Caspian area, that are both positive and
negative. That is, it is a mixed blessing, one that is both an ominous
development signaling a new level of Russian militarism as well as a
crisis of opportunity, to forge closer ties with Russia and enhance
its chance of membership in the Shanghai Cooperation Organization,
the grouping dominated by Russia and China.
Yet, the immediate gains for Iran may not exceed the net losses in the
long run and Tehran may have blundered by not forcefully criticizing
Moscow’s violation of Georgia’s sovereignty. Iran and Georgia have
strong historical connections: Iran was in possession of Georgia for
some 400 years until the humiliating defeats at the hands of tsarist
Russia in the early 19th century, culminating in the Russia-Iran
Treaties of Gulistan in 1813 and Turkmanchai in 1828. Under these,
about a third of Iranian territory was ceded to Russia, including
Georgia and Armenia.
Then and now, Iran remains weary of Russia’s imperial intentions and,
more recently, this was evident seven years ago when in the aftermath
of a failed summit on the division of Caspian Sea, the then-president
Vladimir Putin ordered a massive naval maneuver in the Caspian Sea
as a stern message to Iran.
Should Putin, now premier, succeed with his "splendid little war"
in South Caucasus, Russia’s neighbors to the east must expect to
see more samples of Russian power projection, again a prospect that
simultaneously entices and yet terrifies Iran and is bound to have
contradictory policy ramifications for Tehran’s decision-makers.
Thus, on the one hand, no matter how cordial present Iran-Russia
relations may be, the big neighbor’s power and increasing militarism
impacts Iran’s national security calculus and may strengthen the
arguments of those who are in favor of a nuclear defense strategy.
On the other hand, there is no doubt Russian Foreign Minister
Sergei Lavrov’s statement that the world "can forget about Georgia’s
territorial integrity" is unacceptable to Tehran, which has recently
submitted a package of proposals focusing on international cooperation.
Russia’s exercise of power is substantively the same as the US’s
illegal post-September 11, 2001, invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq and,
naturally, Iran cannot adopt one set of standards for one and another
for the other, irrespective of Moscow’s legitimate grievances about
the US’s and NATO’s intentions and actions around it.
Rather, Tehran must demonstrate consistency with its own foreign policy
criteria, otherwise its international prestige and regional standing
will suffer, no matter how the Kremlin may be displeased with a bold,
yet principled, Iranian stance on this neighboring crisis.
What is more, whereas Iran during the presidency of Mohammad Khatami
offered to play a mediating role in the Chechen crisis, today there is
a conspicuous absence of any similar gesture on Tehran’s part. This
is unfortunate since Iran can indeed play an effective role in
"third-party" mediation.
Mediation in international conflicts requires skilled negotiation and
facilitation of dialogue between the hostile parties and, in this case,
Iran could take advantage of its impartiality and proximity to the
warring sides to act as a successful mediator, perhaps in tandem with
other actors, such as the UN and the OSCE (Organization for Security
and Cooperation in Europe), in light of past Iran-OSCE collaboration
with respect to the civil war in Tajikistan and the Armenia-Azerbaijan
conflict over the disputed territory of Nagorno-Karabakh.
Instead of adopting such proactive steps, Tehran has settled for a
quiet diplomacy, as a passive bystander, thus causing an attrition
of its image as a regional player, which it can remedy by a timely
intervention as a mediator in line with its own foreign policy
principles and standards.
Russia’s action against Georgia violates the UN charter and causes
collateral damage on the integrity and security of the sovereign
rights of Russia’s other neighbors, including Iran, which a mere half
a century ago was threatened by partition when the Soviet red army
refused to leave northern Iran at the end of World War II.
Clearly, as with the collapse of the Doha rounds of negotiations on
world trade, the crisis in South Caucasus reflects a serious erosion
of international law and growing anarchy in international affairs,
a sliding back toward the Cold War bifurcations and the renewal of
the big power sphere of influence politics, albeit rationalized as
Russia’s own "Monroe doctrine", precisely when such bifurcations and
seemingly defunct doctrines and cliches appear a relic of a bygone era.
The new post-Cold War era still remains a largely unfulfilled premise,
or rather promise on the part of the big powers, which need to
give up their propensity to use hard power to pursue their imperial
intentions. But, old habits die hard and the US’s NATO-led intervention
in Russia’s backyard has elicited in essence today’s Russia’s military
gambit inside Georgian territory. This is a sobering lesson of how
that premise still remains simply a potential, a wishful dream.
Kaveh L Afrasiabi, PhD, is the author of After Khomeini: New Directions
in Iran’s Foreign Policy (Westview Press) and co-author of "Negotiating
Iran’s Nuclear Populism", Brown Journal of World Affairs, Volume XII,
Issue 2, Summer 2005, with Mustafa Kibaroglu. He also wrote "Keeping
Iran’s nuclear potential latent", Harvard International Review, and is
author of Iran’s Nuclear Program: Debating Facts Versus Fiction. For
his Wikipedia entry, click here.