Iran's strategic predicament

Middle East Journal

Volumn 54, Issue 1, 2000, Pages

  Chubin, Shahram ^a  

^a NONE

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EID: 0034366202     PISSN: 00263141     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: None     Document Type: Article

References (22)

1. As John Lewis Gaddis writes about strategy, "Some principles of strategy are so basic that when stated they sound like platitudes: treat former enemies magnanimously: do not take on unnecessarily new ones; keep the big picture in view; balance ends and means; avoid emotion and isolation in making decisions; be willing to acknowledge error." John Lewis Gaddis," History, Grand Strategy and NATO Enlargement," Survival vol.40 no1 (Spring 1998), p. 145.
2. IRNA Tehran, Home Service 8 February in BBC SWB ME/0381/A/1-4, 10 February 1989.
3. The term refers to the notion that democracies do not go to war with other democracies. For a detailed discussion of this issue see Michael Brown, Sean Lynn-Jones and Steven Miller Debating the Democratic Peace: An International Security Reader (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1996).
4. Francis Fukuyama, The End of History and the Last Man (New York: Free Press, 1992).
5. Robert Cooper, The Post Modern State and World Order (London: Demos, 1996).
6. Robert Kaplan, "The Coming Anarchy," The Atlantic Monthly (February 1994), pp.44-76.
7. Paul Kennedy, Preparing for the Twenty-first Century (London: Harper Collins, 1993).
8. Joseph Nye, Bound to Lead: The Changing Nature of American Power (NewYork: Basic Books, 1990).
9. Thus the Rahbar (Supreme Religious Leader), Ayatollah Sayyid 'Ali Khamene'i, addressing a conference of parliamentarians from Muslim states. Islamic Republic of Iran News Agency (IRNA), Tehran 15 June 1999, reported in BBC Summary of World Broadcasts, ME3562MED/1, 16 June 1999. Iran is not alone in seeking to hold back the flood. A more restrained criticism of the threat posed by the dominance of US culture often voiced in Europe (and especially France) came from the former head of the BBC, John Birt. He argued that national cultures could be degraded by the vulgar and sensational, that the global culture that was emerging was essentially American, and that it threatened to "undermine all national cultures." His answer was to encourage reason and rationality and to argue for the need for a civilising force like the BBC. See Gautam Malkhani, "Outgoing BBC Chief Warns of US threat to Culture" The Financial Times (London), 7 July 1999, p. 8. See the report from Human Rights Watch, which argues that the Arab states have tried and failed to battle against public access to the Internet. David Gardner, "Arab States Fail to Curb Internet" The Financial Times, 8 July 1999. p.5. The full Human Rights Watch report is available online at http://www.hrw.org/advocacy/internet/mena/index.htm. See also Howard Schneider, "The Arab World is Logging on Slowly and Ambivalently to the Internet" International Herald Tribune (Paris), 27 July 1999, p. 4.
10. Thus the Rahbar (Supreme Religious Leader), Ayatollah Sayyid 'Ali Khamene'i, addressing a conference of parliamentarians from Muslim states. Islamic Republic of Iran News Agency (IRNA), Tehran 15 June 1999, reported in BBC Summary of World Broadcasts, ME3562MED/1, 16 June 1999. Iran is not alone in seeking to hold back the flood. A more restrained criticism of the threat posed by the dominance of US culture often voiced in Europe (and especially France) came from the former head of the BBC, John Birt. He argued that national cultures could be degraded by the vulgar and sensational, that the global culture that was emerging was essentially American, and that it threatened to "undermine all national cultures." His answer was to encourage reason and rationality and to argue for the need for a civilising force like the BBC. See Gautam Malkhani, "Outgoing BBC Chief Warns of US threat to Culture" The Financial Times (London), 7 July 1999, p. 8. See the report from Human Rights Watch, which argues that the Arab states have tried and failed to battle against public access to the Internet. David Gardner, "Arab States Fail to Curb Internet" The Financial Times, 8 July 1999. p.5. The full Human Rights Watch report is available online at http://www.hrw.org/advocacy/internet/mena/index.htm. See also Howard Schneider, "The Arab World is Logging on Slowly and Ambivalently to the Internet" International Herald Tribune (Paris), 27 July 1999, p. 4.
11. Thus the Rahbar (Supreme Religious Leader), Ayatollah Sayyid 'Ali Khamene'i, addressing a conference of parliamentarians from Muslim states. Islamic Republic of Iran News Agency (IRNA), Tehran 15 June 1999, reported in BBC Summary of World Broadcasts, ME3562MED/1, 16 June 1999. Iran is not alone in seeking to hold back the flood. A more restrained criticism of the threat posed by the dominance of US culture often voiced in Europe (and especially France) came from the former head of the BBC, John Birt. He argued that national cultures could be degraded by the vulgar and sensational, that the global culture that was emerging was essentially American, and that it threatened to "undermine all national cultures." His answer was to encourage reason and rationality and to argue for the need for a civilising force like the BBC. See Gautam Malkhani, "Outgoing BBC Chief Warns of US threat to Culture" The Financial Times (London), 7 July 1999, p. 8. See the report from Human Rights Watch, which argues that the Arab states have tried and failed to battle against public access to the Internet. David Gardner, "Arab States Fail to Curb Internet" The Financial Times, 8 July 1999. p.5. The full Human Rights Watch report is available online at http://www.hrw.org/advocacy/internet/mena/index.htm. See also Howard Schneider, "The Arab World is Logging on Slowly and Ambivalently to the Internet" International Herald Tribune (Paris), 27 July 1999, p. 4.
12. See the author's paper on refugees and minorities in Iran presented to the conference "From the Indus to the Euphrates," St. Anthony's College, Oxford 23-25 April 1999. Also see the article by Bahram Rajaee in this issue.
13. Robin Wright, "The Iranian Revolution, Part II Comes into Focus," Los Angeles Times, 18 July 1999.
14. See Gary Sick, "The Coming Crisis in the Persian Gulf," Washington Quarterly (Washington, DC) Spring 1998.
15. Notably Michael Ignatieff on the culture of self-pity. See "The Bitter Men who Waited to Kill", The Sunday Times (London), 20 June 1999, p.26. Note Larry Hollingworth on the Serbs: "They are at their best when the odds are against them; often the odds are self-inflicted." "Time for Serbian Self-Examination", International Herald Tribune, 6 July 1999, p.5. One Serb referred to the dangers of too much history: "But we learned that you cannot live from history. Americans have no history and they live wonderfully well." Roger Cohen, "Milosevic's Brutality in Pursuit of Greater Serbia Hastened its Downfall." International Herald Tribune 3-4 July 1999, p.5.
16. Notably Michael Ignatieff on the culture of self-pity. See "The Bitter Men who Waited to Kill", The Sunday Times (London), 20 June 1999, p.26. Note Larry Hollingworth on the Serbs: "They are at their best when the odds are against them; often the odds are self-inflicted." "Time for Serbian Self-Examination", International Herald Tribune, 6 July 1999, p.5. One Serb referred to the dangers of too much history: "But we learned that you cannot live from history. Americans have no history and they live wonderfully well." Roger Cohen, "Milosevic's Brutality in Pursuit of Greater Serbia Hastened its Downfall." International Herald Tribune 3-4 July 1999, p.5.
17. Notably Michael Ignatieff on the culture of self-pity. See "The Bitter Men who Waited to Kill", The Sunday Times (London), 20 June 1999, p.26. Note Larry Hollingworth on the Serbs: "They are at their best when the odds are against them; often the odds are self-inflicted." "Time for Serbian Self-Examination", International Herald Tribune, 6 July 1999, p.5. One Serb referred to the dangers of too much history: "But we learned that you cannot live from history. Americans have no history and they live wonderfully well." Roger Cohen, "Milosevic's Brutality in Pursuit of Greater Serbia Hastened its Downfall." International Herald Tribune 3-4 July 1999, p.5.
18. This has been borne out again and again in key developing countries. See Eric Arnett (ed.) Military Capacity and the Risk of War: China, India, Pakistan and Iran (Oxford: Oxford University Press for SIPRI, 1997).
19. For a recent discussion of the phenomenon in Asia, see "Armies in Business: Asia's Boardroom Brass" The Economist (London), 10 July 1999, pp. 78-79.
20. To take two recent cases, during the student demonstrations against hardline repression, the Guards Corps and a related foundation condemned the students while the Defense Minister, Admiral 'Ali Shamkhani, gave a gratuitous commentary on their origins and intentions. See IRNA, 13 July and 14 July 1999, in BBC/ME/3587MED/3, 15 July 1999. More serious was the veiled warning issued by 24 senior Pasdaran officers to President Muhammad Khatami expressing the limits to their patience in the face of his failure to "do his Islamic duty" before it was too late. The implied threat of a military coup shows how far the Islamic hardliners have politicized the military. See Mouna Naim: "Les adversaires du président Iranien sont de plus en plus offensifs" ("The Adversaries of the Iranian President are More and More on the Offensive"), Le Monde, 22 July 1999, p.3.
21. See Fred Halliday "The Iranian Revolution: Uneven Development and Religious Populism," Journal of International Affairs, (Winter 1983).
22. On the degree to which in retrospect the Soviet leaders became imprisoned by their ideology see John Lewis Gaddis, We Now Know: Rethinking Cold War History (New York: Oxford University Press, 1996).